I know ther was largely rhetorical but yes you do really need to go to Kenting. I spent 4 days there and weather was a little chilly and cloudy but not at all smoggy. Yesterday and the day before were mostly sunny actually!
That was until I drove past Kaohsiung on the way back to Taipei yesterday which was bloody awful, as bad as I have ever seen it in Taiwan. A thick haze covered everything.
Kenting was only an hour or so away from the apocalypse.
The rest of Taiwan was cloudy and rainy so was hard to tell how much was pollution related.
This year (and the last couple of years) the pollution levels in Taipei seem to be quite bad. That may be my subjective estimate but thatās what I perceive. Itās could be related to the relatively low rainfall and mild winter. That is why pollution is so bad in the winter months in the center and Southā¦very low rainfall at that time to wash out the shit.
iāve noticed it too. absolutely sick of it. iām not sure how they expect to attract all these tourists when the country looks like the bag of shit it does right now.
The first time I visited It also bothered me. Then I saw so many people wearing masks.
Before visiting the second time, I bought air pollution masks from Airhale.com
I should say that it helped quite a lot
This map shows a model of concentrations of carbon monoxide for a period of time. Yes, China looks bad, but there are some worrisome flashes from Taiwanā¦
This thread reminds me of an old joke. Taiwan expat in South Africa has a cold he just can`t get rid of. He goes to the Saffie doctor. Doctor gives him the normal remedy. Does not work. Comes back a few days later. Doctor tells him to defecate in a tupperware container, add paint solvent, chemical sprays, and a whole bunch of other nasty chemicals, etc. Then the doctor tell him to close the container, wait an hour, and breathe in the fumes.
Expat comes back a week later and is full of praise. I was immediately cured, he tells the doctor.
You were not sick from a bug or virus, the doctors says. You were homesick.
Itās crazy isnāt it. VERY interesting data that shows hiw much we DONT KNOW because we donāt have the right tools and analytics and research happening.
The whole country gets swiped with a CO cloud at different times, lets link that with data in heart attacks, asthma attacks and see if anything comes out of it?
Latest research is pointing to NO and SO2 and CO and O3 as being reallly pretty bad for usā¦they all come out of vehicle exhausts. They act as signaling molecules in the blood or else as competitors for oxygen binding.
A great detailed piece, with a focus on the impact of energy policy especially in central Taiwan, whose residents bears the brunt of health risks from burning coal.
A solution suggested deeper into the article: stop using so damn much electricity (in the case of Taiwan as a whole, around 50% more per capita than what is consumed per capita in Germany).
This is part of a long history of decision makers in Taipei dumping dirty and dangerous elements far from their precious homes: heavy polluting industry in Kaohsiung; dirty coal in Taichung; low-level nuclear waste on Lanyu. Itās not just an energy policy problem; itās a problem with Taiwanās political structure.
Iāve always had breathing problems that were corrected with septoplasty surgery (I had a deviated septum). My breathing has gotten worse over the years since Iāve moved here. Maybe I should start wearing a face mask wherever I goā¦
Most of the people you see donning a mask are not sick. Theyāre protecting themselves from the bad air and sick people. A few of them might be local celebrities.