Tighten car and motorbike emissions and construction management to make Hanoi's sky 'clear' again

Inner city is heavily polluted due to traffic and construction.

Ms. Le Thanh Thuy, Deputy Head of the Environmental Management Department (Hanoi Department of Agriculture and Environment) said that in recent years the city has been under great pressure from air pollution, which can be seen through monitoring data. Specifically, Hanoi recorded high concentrations of PM2.5 fine dust, which fluctuated strongly, especially in the winter months.

“According to our records, air quality in Hanoi varies by region, with inner-city districts having higher AQI (air quality index). Partly due to higher traffic density and more construction activities taking place in the inner city,” said Ms. Thuy.

Photo caption — The layer of fine dust covering the capital affects people's health.

According to Ms. Thuy, the number of polluted days in Hanoi will increase dramatically in late 2024 and early 2025. At the end of the year, urban beautification activities are frequent, traffic congestion occurs, construction material transportation increases, garbage burning, by-product burning, especially at the end of the year when votive paper is burned at temples.

In particular, Hanoi has 7.6 million vehicles, not including vehicles from outside the province, which operate more and more each year. Construction activities have not been fully monitored, leading to poor compliance with technical solutions such as covering, washing vehicles, and poor sanitation.

The cause of air pollution in the capital is also industrial production activities in the area, many craft villages in neighboring provinces are also sources of pollution for Hanoi. "The weather has not been favorable to Hanoi, while activities are concentrated at the end of the year," Ms. Thuy said.

Regarding the same issue, Dr. Hoang Duong Tung, Chairman of the Vietnam Clean Air Network, said that recycled craft villages are one of the sources of air pollution. This has been clearly pointed out and there are many administrative management solutions such as licenses, environmental impact assessments, standards, regulations, etc.

“So why do we have experience but cannot solve the problem? We talk about the cause of pollution being industrial production but we do not know how the production facilities cause pollution. For example, Hanoi has not yet determined in detail which production facilities or craft villages emit how much and how much pollution,” Dr. Hoang Duong Tung wondered.

Therefore, Mr. Tung believes that it is necessary to build a pollution map to determine which craft villages cause pollution and how much pollution is emitted. Making a pollution map in the context of digital transformation will not be too difficult or cost too much money. When there is this map, the functional unit will have a solution to manage emission sources in parallel with administrative management measures.

“The cause of pollution in Hanoi does not only come from Hanoi but also from outside sources, other localities such as Bac Ninh , Ninh Binh, Hung Yen. Therefore, it is necessary to coordinate and evaluate the sources of pollution in these provinces, from which there are synchronous solutions,” Mr. Hoang Duong Tung noted.

Building pollution maps, tightening emissions from cars and motorbikes

Mr. Le Hoai Nam - Deputy Director of the Department of Environment said that the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment has submitted to the Prime Minister a draft Regulation on the roadmap for applying national technical regulations on emissions from automobiles circulating in Vietnam. According to the draft, there will be a roadmap to tighten emission standards for automobiles circulating in Vietnam with 5 standard levels. This is the most important document to reduce emissions from automobiles in Vietnam.

According to the draft, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City will apply automobile emission standards with an earlier and stricter roadmap. Specifically, cars manufactured from 2017 to 2021 will have to apply level 4 standards from January 1, 2027. For cars manufactured after 2022, they will have to comply with level 5 standards from January 1, 2028. “These are very specific regulations applied in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City to reduce air pollution,” said Mr. Nam.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Environment has also submitted to the Prime Minister a draft roadmap for applying standards for motorbikes and scooters participating in traffic in Vietnam with 4 levels. In the draft, the environmental sector proposed that Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City alone must apply stricter levels.

Accordingly, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City will start applying from July 1, 2027, other provinces and cities will gradually apply after that. This time frame was chosen to build a nationwide network of emission inspection stations in time to meet the inspection needs of nearly 80 million motorbikes.

To improve the capital's air quality, Ms. Le Thanh Thuy, Deputy Head of the Environmental Management Department (Hanoi Department of Agriculture and Environment) said that there has never been a determination to improve air pollution quality as high as it is now.

The city has launched relatively specific programs to improve air quality. To 'catch the right disease' causing pollution, Hanoi will first conduct a general inspection of emission sources such as transportation and construction activities. From there, the city will prioritize the budget to deal with pollution sources.

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