Dystopian Reality of China's Smog Captured in 'Airpocalypse' App

On many days, the sun is hidden behind a pale, brown veil of coal dust and other pollutants that is visible from space and smells like a chemical spill on fire. The United States Embassy’s air quality readings — widely viewed as more accurate than China’s official data — are censored on local smartphones. Air pollution has been linked to a spike in cancer rates in Beijing, a city made almost “uninhabitable for human beings” by smog, according to a study published last year by the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences.

The American Embassy’s air quality index, or A.Q.I., uses standards set by the United States Environmental Protection Agency to measure pollutants on a scale that starts at zero, or “good,” and tops out at 500. Anything higher, as was recorded in Beijing in mid-January, is officially referred to as “beyond index.”

Expats call these bouts of horrifying pollution an “airpocalypse.” Not only does the term convey the epic dystopian reality of China’s smog, it offers a welcome bit of gallows humor amid an otherwise hopelessly depressing situation.

During his five years living in Shanghai, Tom Suharto, an American who works in advertising, grew frustrated that Chinese A.Q.I. mobile apps failed to reflect the emotional side effects of smog.

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The New York Times