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Previous studies have found that global burned area products based on coarse resolution sensors tend to miss small fires ( 5 days). A burned area reference dataset from Sentinel-2 (S2) images was built to validate those burned area products in China. The extent to which the difference in the spatial and temporal resolutions affecting the total burned area was measured based on the spatial and temporal intercomparison of burned area products. Accuracy metrics, including both omission (undetected burned pixels) and commission errors (unburned pixels classified as burned), were used in this study. The preliminary results indicate that the ability of global burned area products to detect small fires needs to be improved. This work imposes the essential requirement of relatively high spatial and temporal resolution burned area products for small fires.

China, with its growing population and economic development, faces increasing risks to health from climate change, but also opportunities to address these risks and protect health for generations to come. Without a timely and adequate response, climate change will impact lives and livelihoods at an accelerated rate. In 2020, the Lancet Countdown Regional Centre in Asia, led by Tsinghua University, built on the work of the global Lancet Countdown and began its assessment of the health profile of climate change in China with the aim of triggering rapid and health-responsive actions. This 2021 report is the first annual update, presenting 25 indicators within five domains: climate change impacts, exposures, and vulnerability; adaptation, planning, and resilience for health; mitigation actions and health co-benefits; economics and finance; and public and political engagement. The report represents the contributions of 88 experts from 25 leading institutions in, and outside of, China. From 2020 to 2021, five new indicators have been added and methods have been improved for many indicators. Where possible, the indicator results are presented at national and provincial levels to facilitate local understanding and policy making. In a year marked by COVID-19, this report also endeavours to reflect on China's pathway for a green recovery, ensuring it aligns with the carbon neutrality goal, for the health of the current and future generations.

Left unmitigated, climate change poses a catastrophic risk to human health, demanding an urgent and concerted response from every country. The 2015 Lancet Commission on Health and Climate Change and The Lancet Countdown: Tracking Progress on Health and Climate Change have been initiated to map out the impacts of climate change and the necessary policy responses. To meet these challenges, Tsinghua University, partnering with the University College London and 17 Chinese and international institutions, has prepared the Chinese Lancet Countdown report, which has a national focus and builds on the work of the global Lancet Countdown: Tracking Progress on Health and Climate Change. Drawing on international methodologies and frameworks, this report aims to deepen the understanding of the links between public health and climate change at the national level and track them with 23 indicators. This work is part of the Lancet's Countdown broader efforts to develop regional expertise on this topic, and coincides with the launch of the Lancet Countdown Regional Centre in Asia, based at Tsinghua University. The data and results of this report are presented at the provincial level, where possible, to facilitate targeted response strategies for local decision-makers. Based on the data and findings of the 2020 Chinese Lancet Countdown report, five recommendations are proposed to key stakeholders in health and climate change in China: (1) Enhance inter-departmental cooperation. Climate change is a challenge that demands an integrated response from all sectors, urgently requiring substantial inter-departmental cooperation among health, environment, energy, economic, financial, and education authorities. (2) Strengthen health emergency preparedness. Knowledge and findings on current and future climate-related health threats still lack the required attention and should be fully integrated into the emergency preparedness and response system. (3) Support research and raise awareness. Additional financial support should be allocated to health and climate change research in China to enhance health system adaptation, mitigation measures, and their health benefits. At the same time, media and academia should be fully motivated to raise the public and politicians' awareness of this topic. (4) Increase climate change mitigation. Speeding up the phasing out of coal is necessary to be consistent with China's pledge to be carbon neutral by 2060 and to continue to reduce air pollution. Fossil fuel subsidies must also be phased out. (5) Ensure the recovery from COVID-19 to protect health now and in the future. China's efforts to recover from COVID-19 will shape public health for years to come. Climate change should be a priority in these interventions.

In the term of climate Change, wildfire exposures are increasingly recognized as an important public health issue especially in China. Indicators proposed in our study capture the change in human exposure to wildfire lifecycle in China from 2001 to 2019 in three aspects: pre-fire risk, active fire biomass burning and post-fire destruction. Although the fire risk indicator scarcely grew through 2001–2019, national combustion exposure went up in most years while fire influenced population displays the tendency of rising up at the beginning and declining later. Northern provinces in China saw the largest growth in fire risk, and the Northeast reports the biggest rise of fire exposure and burned area affected population, while East-China experienced the largest shrink in burned area affected population. The result implies a stronger need for better wildfire monitor and control.

With the rapid urbanization, the transportation system, especially the bus system, plays an increasingly prominent role in city planning. However, the current bus evaluation model usually focuses on just one aspect either spatial or temporal. Inspired by “Pulsation Analysis”, this study presents a new approach for evaluating Service Level of Bus as well as Demand for Public Transport based on both spatial and temporal aspects of the bus trips, called “Public Transit Pulsation Analysis”. The transport pulsation assessment model which assesses the supply side and the demand of community for bus model which calculates the demand side, are combined to optimize the bus frequency settings in this approach. The proposed method is tested on a real case study in Tianjin, China, which implies its usefulness in evaluating the service level and improving the service quality of the bus system by 17.6%. As well as developing a bus frequency optimization model, this study also demonstrates its real-world application of “Pulsation Analysis” for decision-making in city planning.