Qinhuangdao, a port city in north China's Hebei Province, is going all out to help ensure blue skies as a co-host of this summer's Olympic Games, the local environmental protection bureau said on Friday.

Qinhuangdao, 280 kilometers east of Beijing, has invested 20 billion yuan (about 2.78 billion U.S. dollars) in a major environmental protection drive with aim to improve air quality for the August Olympiad.

The drive included 2,00 projects featuring air pollution control,industrial sewage recycling, city garbage treatment, development of environmentally-friendly tourism, water sources protection and afforestation, according to the bureau.

The government ordered all desulfurization projects at major coal-fired power plants to be completed before July 1.

Local chemical plants and iron mines are now required to cut pollutants that might darken the Olympic skies and water. In addition, the city has set up an air-quality monitoring network focused on heavily-polluting businesses.

Hebei, the province that surrounds Beijing and Tianjin, has also pledged to spend about 21 billion yuan on anti-pollution projects and environmental monitoring stations, said Ji Zhenhai, the provincial environmental protection bureau director. Businesses in heavily-polluting industries -- power, iron and steel, chemicals and concrete -- will have to cut production or even close if they fail to meet the emission standard during the Games.

The projects could reduce Hebei's annual emissions of about 550,000 tons of sulphur dioxide, he said.

(Xinhua News Agency February 29, 2008)