Qingdao city in Shandong province creates a pilot model for green city construction and exploring new paths for urban development. [Photo by Wang Haibin/for chinadaily.com.cn]

Qingdao city in Shandong province is creating a pilot model for green city construction and exploring new paths for urban development.

The city has introduced the Implementation Opinions on Accelerating the Pilot of Green City Construction and Development, which focuses on four major categories - green finance, ecology, construction and life experience.

Key measures include fostering five green and low-carbon pilot areas such as the Zero Carbon Zone of Sino-German Ecopark and the Zero Carbon Community at the Qingdao Olympic Sailing Center.

In terms of infrastructure, Qingdao has completed the Jiaozhou Bay underwater natural gas pipeline and initiated the "coal-to-gas" transformation of coal-fired boilers for urban heating. It has added an additional 36.5 square kilometers of sponge city standards, built charging and swapping facilities, and built 130 million sq m of green buildings.

Qingdao has mandated a green building material usage rate of no less than 40 percent for pilot projects and established a supervision internet platform integrating functions such as intelligent design, material trading, online testing, green finance, intelligent archives and supervision management.

The city is also enhancing the well-being of all residents and constructing 286 kilometers of greenways, 129 pocket parks and 370 three-dimensional green spaces. It has completed 103 public parking lots with approximately 39,000 new parking spaces. Qingdao has also launched the country's first 5G hydrogen fuel vehicle demonstration line.

To boost industry-city integration, Qingdao is driving the green development entire industrial chain. It has built a leading national architectural industrial internet trading platform. To date, 1,006 green building materials have been included.