Anyone who’s been to Beijing lately would instantly recognize the photo left. It’s the glorious capital of China, rendered completely invisible by pollution. This was taken in August, four years after the Chinese government spent a reported US$19 billion to clean the air for the 2008 Olympics.

Air quality improved after the Olympics, and there have been good days since, but why August was this bad is something of a mystery. Trying to get to the bottom of the air-quality-in-China issue is the work of China Air Daily, a web site produced by the Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations. The site is produced by the journalist-programmer Michael Zhao. China Air Daily publishes near-hourly snapshots several times a day. You can see how blue it was for most of March 2011.

via How Dirty Are China’s Skies? A Daily Photo Archive Shows The Truth – Forbes.