Cutting Through the Fog with China's First Pollution Information Transparency Index (PITI)

Developing a coordinated international effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions requires, among other things, that countries have confidence in each others’ capacity to monitor and mitigate their GHG emissions. Reliable emissions data in turn relies on the existence of governance systems that make energy and environmental information transparent and publicly available. In May 2008, the Chinese government took a critical step toward furthering environmental transparency by adopting a pair of sweeping pollution disclosure measures that for the first time required government bodies at all levels to make certain pollution information publicly available. The Institute of Public & Environmental Affairs (IPE) and the Natural Resources Defense Council developed a Pollution Information Transparency Index (PITI) to carry out a systematic assessment of the first year of implementation for these regulations.