An aerial view of urban Pingliang. [Photo/WeChat account: pingliangfabu]

Pingliang in Gansu province has continued to improve its environmental quality this year, with cleaner air, greener urban spaces, and improved river and wetland ecosystems.

The city has expanded urban greenery by converting vacant plots, unused land, and roadside spaces into pocket parks, small green spaces, and landscaped corridors. Green coverage in the urban area has reached 44 percent, while per capita park green space stands at 16.8 square meters.

Pingliang has also strengthened air pollution controls, targeting coal burning, vehicle emissions, industrial pollution, construction dust, non-point sources, and ozone. It has accelerated clean-heating upgrades and tightened controls on vehicle emissions, construction sites, and other pollution sources.

In the first half of the year, the average PM2.5 concentration in the central urban area fell 14.6 percent year-on-year, while the improvement in PM10 concentration ranked first in the province.

Ecological improvement has also focused on rivers and wetlands. Along the 24.5-kilometer section of the Jinghe River in Kongtong district, embankments have been reinforced, 450 mu (30 hectares) of wetlands restored, and 23 km of ecological shoreline improved. A total of 124 hectares has undergone ecological rehabilitation.

During the first half of the year, Pingliang completed ecological restoration across 343,400 mu of forests and grasslands and planted 3.77 million trees, while also restoring 55 abandoned mines and addressing 154 sites requiring environmental remediation.