Across provinces near Beijing, govt has banned burning coal for residential heating to reduce pollution. At first, local govts eased the transition by heavily subsidising natural gas, which is cleaner but expensive. But this winter, officials cut the subsidies. Now, villagers are forced to sunbathe for warmth (NYT photo)

QUYANG: The temperature was 28, but Dong Tongzhou had turned off his heat at home and was standing in the village square wrapped in a tattered coat, trying to soak up the midday sun. He wasn’t alone – other villagers sat on folding chairs and at a card table, as chickens strutted around and clucked.Dong, 68, used to warm his home by burning coal, he explained on an afternoon. Then govt banned that for environmental reasons, and offered natural gas as a replacement. But that could cost three times as much. To save money, Dong often sunbathed for warmth.Even so, Dong said he spent about 1,000 yuan, or about $143, each winter to heat his home in Quyang county, in northern China’s Hebei province. On a monthly basis, that works out to over a third of his pension of 800 yuan as a retired farmer and former soldier. “If it gets even more expensive, then I’ll stop using it,” Dong said. Across Hebei, which encircles China’s capital, Beijing, villagers like Dong are confronting the full cost of the country’s push for cleaner air. The central govt has banned burning coal for residential heating in much of the province since 2017, to reduce the choking air pollution that enveloped the capital every winter. At first, local govts eased the transition by subsidising natural gas, which is cleaner but more expensive. But this winter, subsidies have been cut.Reports of villagers huddling under multiple blankets or secretly burning firewood for warmth – firewood is banned, too – had circulated on Chinese social media. But China’s gains in air quality have been a political priority for govt, and many of the reports were censored.While villagers ration their heat, Beijing officials are celebrating a victory. Last week, the city announced it had recorded only one day of heavy pollution in 2025, a 98% drop compared with 2013. Officials held up the improvement as proof of the success of Beijing’s “blue sky defence war.” Beyond the rising costs, poorer villagers often seem to end up paying more than city residents to heat their homes. The price of gas per cubic meter in Hebei is 10% to 20% higher than in Beijing or Tianjin, according to media reports. Over the long term, the answer is likely to lie less in natural gas and more in renewable energy. “China is already the world’s leading producer of solar and wind power, and as power becomes cheaper, electric devices like heat pumps can replace gas boilers and coal furnaces, cutting emissions and, eventually, costs,” said Deborah Seligsohn, a professor at Villanova University. The Hebei villagers’ plight was not proof that China’s green transition had to come at the expense of ordinary people, she said. Rather, “this is an issue with inconsistent policy: They had subsidies and they got rid of them,” she said. But installing a heat pump requires a large upfront payment. “Installation costs more than $2,800,” Wang, a heat store employee, said, adding govt did not offer any subsidies. That was too expensive for many villagers, Wang said. After all, “many won’t even turn on their gas.”