The weather in Beijing is on everyone’s mind just days ahead of the Olympic Games, but when asked about rescheduling endurance events, the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) Games executive director Gilbert Felli said, “now, we don’t feet it necessary”. China Daily reports Felli said the IOC would continue to monitor the air quality and take decisions accordingly, adding the low visibility doesn’t necessarily mean the air quality is bad.
“Most of the people see the fog, they say it’s pollution. But we know here it’s not pollution. It’s mist, a fact of nature”, he told Xinhua. “Probably more rains will come and it will get better”, he said.
Local meteorological authorities said Monday Beijing will get cooler weather in August. The Games open August 8, one day after the first day of autumn on the Chinese lunar calendar, which is expected to be less humid, said Guo Hu, director of the Beijing Meteorological Observatory. Guo said that based on 30 years of data, the average temperature for the Games will be 24.9 deg. Celsius. He said, “the temperature and humidity will gradually drop and we will have better air quality and more comfortable weather in August”.
More than 190 environmentally friendly technologies were adopted to construct Olympic projects, said Yang Weiguang, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission. He told a press conference Monday that 77 environmental and ecological protection technologies, including noise control, landscaping, environmental protection facilities and solid waste disposal, were incorporated into the Olympic construction.
Also, 11 water utilization and reclaimed water treatment technologies, 46 green construction material application technologies, and 57 environmental protection product application technologies were used for Olympic construction. Yang said in the face of rising oil prices worldwide, applying clean and renewable energy to Olympic projects is economical, environmentally friendly, and safe.
The IOC is to investigate apparent censorship of the Internet service provided for the media covering the Games, Kevan Gosper, IOC press head said Tuesday. Reuters reports attempts to use the Internet at the Main Press Centre to access Amnesty International’s website, which released a report Monday criticizing China for failing to honour its Olympic human rights pledges, proved fruitless. Gosper said the IOC would look into anything that interfered with reporters reporting on the Games. Gasper is also looking into complaints that the Internet provided for media was too slow. He said, “we’re looking into that and we’ve tracked that information into BOCOG immediately because free access to the Internet also means normal speed”.
Meanwhile Beijing will be the first host city to produce a full Olympic Games Impact (OGI) report and a Paralympic Games Impact (PGI) report in 2010, said Feng Huiling, vice president of Renmin University of China and director of the Humanistic Olympics Studies Center at the university.
According to Xinhua the OGI project, conducted by the IOC and Beijing 2008 is designed to introduce a standardized cross-Games method of monitoring, measuring and reporting on the long-term impact of hosting Olympic Games.
Feng said, “the two reports, first ever in the Olympic history, will be not only a Games legacy, but also a model for future Olympic host cities. The cities of Vancouver and London have both come to us for experiences”.
Feng said the projects study a wide range of social, economic and environmental indicators. “It is the first time for us to conduct such a huge cross-subjects project”.
The final report will be in 2010.
