The Toxic side of China

no smoking

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What is the problem with that some are dying let them die for economy's sake keep the rate high why should care for those? If some plants have to be closed then what will happen to those who are earning from it?
The problem is we already moved on from beginning stage of economic development. Now, chinese public and gov have realised the environmental consequence of mistake. And the good news is that we have the resource to solve this problem. It is time to give more attention to it.
 

nitesh

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The problem is we already moved on from beginning stage of economic development. Now, chinese public and gov have realised the environmental consequence of mistake. And the good news is that we have the resource to solve this problem. It is time to give more attention to it.
Care to explain how you "already moved" from beginning stage of economic development?
What are the steps taken to solve the problem? Can you list them pls
 

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China's efforts on Clean Energy

While China has indeed a terrible record for maintaining pollution standards mainly due to local leaders sacrificing environment to the altar of industrilization and economic progress.

However very quitely China has been making huge investments in developing alternative sources of clean energy.

I had come across a great article by Thomas Friedman who has described the efforts made by China in this clean energy field.

An excrept from the full articles.

“For the last three years, the U.S. has led the world in new wind generation,” said the ecologist Lester Brown, author of “Plan B 4.0.” “By the end of this year, China will bypass us on new wind generation so fast we won’t even see it go by.”

China’s going clean-tech. The view of China in the U.S. Congress — that China is going to try to leapfrog us by out-polluting us — is out of date. It’s going to try to out-green us. Right now, China is focused on low-cost manufacturing of solar, wind and batteries and building the world’s biggest market for these products. It still badly lags U.S. innovation. But research will follow the market.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/opinion/27friedman.html
 

bengalraider

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pollution in china

Amazing Pictures, Pollution in China
October 21st, 2009 by Key | Posted in Featured, News | 982 Comments »
[QQ] October 14, 2009, the 30th annual awards ceremony of the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund took place at the Asia Society in New York City. Lu Guang (卢广) from People’s Republic of China won the $30,000 W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography for his documentary project “Pollution in China.”



The pictures in this thread are not meant for ridiculing china or the way the Chinese are polluting their own land (no china stupid or china weak posts here please) on the contrary they are meant to grieve for the Chinese who have lost their lands and lives to this menace of pollution , India has it's fair share of pollution problems as well . these are not going to go away if swept under the carpet. ultimately the pollution in china hurts ordinary Chinese and when the polluted waters reach the sea and the smoke hits the atmosphere it hurts all the world's people.
 

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1. “At the junction of Ningxia province and Inner Mongolia province, I saw a tall chimney puffing out golden smoke covering the blue sky, large tracts of the grassland have become industrial waste dumps; unbearable foul smell made people want to cough; Surging industrial sewage flowed into the Yellow River…”

- Lu Guang


2. Chemical waste from Jiangsu Taixing Chemical Industrial District (江苏泰兴化工园区) dumped on top of the Yangtze River bank. May 15, 2009


3. Fan Jai Zhuang in Anyang City, Henan province, (河南安阳市范家庄) there is only one wall separating this village from the steelmaking furnaces. The villagers live in this heavily polluted environment where the village is under the iron rain every day. March 24, 2008
 

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4. Industrial sewage of Zhejiang Xiaoshan Industrial District (浙江萧山化工园区) eventually flowed into Qiantang River. April 24, 2009


5. Henan Anyang iron and steel plant’s (河南安阳钢铁厂) sewage flowed into Anyang River. March 25, 2008


6. Guiyu, Guangdong province, (广东省贵屿镇) rivers and reservoirs have been contaminated, the villager is washing in a seriously polluted pond. November 25, 2005
 

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7. Shizuishan Industrial district in Ningxia province (宁夏石嘴山湖滨工业园区), the tall chimneys spitted out smoke and dust. Residents took preventive measure for the falling dust from the sky when going outside. April 22, 2006


8. In the Yellow Sea coastline, countless sewage pipes buried in the beach and even extending into the deep sea. April 28, 2008


9. In Ma’anshan, Anhui province (安徽马鞍山), along the Yangtze River there are many small-scaled Iron selection factories and plastic processing plants. Large amounts of sewage discharged into the Yangtze River June 18, 2009
 

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10. In Inner Mongolia there were 2 “black dragons” from the Lasengmiao Power Plant (内蒙古拉僧庙发电厂) covering the nearby villages. July 26, 2005


11. Jiangsu province Changshu City Fluorine Chemical industry land sewage treatment plant (江苏省常熟市氟化学工业园污水处理厂) was responsible for collection and processing of the industrial sewage. However they did not, the sewage pipe was extended 1500 meters under the Yangtze River and releasing the sewage there. 2009 June 11


12. Soil by Yangtze River, was polluted by Anhui Province Ma’anshan Chemical Industrial District (安徽省马鞍山化工园区). June 26, 2009
 

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13. Large amount of the industrial wastewater flowed to Yellow River from Inner Mongolia Lasengmiao Industrial District (内蒙古拉僧庙工业园区) every day. July 26, 2005


14. A Large amount of the chemical wastewater discharged into Yangtze River from Zhenjiang Titanium mill (镇江市钛粉厂) every day. Less than 1,000 meters away downstream is where the water department of Danyang City gets its water from. June 10, 2009


15. In Haimen city, Jiangsu province Chemical Industrial District sewage treatment Plant (江苏省海门市化工园区污水处理厂) discharged wastewater into Yangtze River. June 5, 2009
 

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16. Hebei Province Shexian Tianjin Iron and steel plant (河北省涉县天津钢铁厂) is a heavily polluting company. Company scale is still growing, seriously affecting the lives of local residents. March 18, 2008


17. Longmen town in Hanchen city, Shaanxi Province (陕西省韩城市龙门镇) has large-scaled industrial development. Environment is very seriously polluted there. April 8, 2008


19. Jiangxi Province Hu Ko County Chemical Industry district (江西省胡口县化工园区) is by the Yangtze River. Chemical factory landfill the Yangtze River bank to expand the scale of the factory without authorization.
 

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20. Anhui Province Cihu Chemical Industry District (安徽省慈湖化工园区) built a underground pipe to discharge wastewater into the Yangtze River. The wastewater sometimes is black, gray, dark red, or yellow, wastewater from different chemical factories has different colors. June 18, 2009


21. Shanxi Province is the most polluted areas of China. It is also the province with the highest rate of birth defects. This loving farmer couple adopted 17 disabled children. April 15, 2009

“In Some areas of China people’s lives were threatened because of the environmental pollution. Residents suffering from all kinds of obscured diseases, the cancer villages, increase of deformed babies, these were the results of sacrificing environment and blindly seeking economical gain.”

- Lu Guang


22. Elder shepherd by the Yellow River cannot stand the smell. April 23, 2006
 

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23. 15-year-old boy from Tianshui, Gansu Province (甘肃天水), dropped out of the school after 2nd grade, followed his parents to Heilonggui (黑龙贵) Industrial District. He earns 16 yuan a day. April 8, 2005


24. Inner Mongolia province Heilonggui (黑龙贵) Industrial District, the couple who worked at the Plaster Kiln and just got home. March 22, 2007


25. Villagers from Kang village in Linfen City, Shanxi Province (山西省临汾市下康村) due to long-term consumption of the polluted water contaminated by industrial waste, there were 50 people who have cancer and cerebral thrombosis. 64-year-old Wang Baosheng got ill since 2003, he has fester all over his body so he cannot go to bed and lying face down on the edge of the bed each day. July 10, 2005
 

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26. Breathing in large amount of dust into the lungs, people gets sick after working there for 1-2 years. Most of these migrant workers come from area of poverty. April 10, 2005


27. Zhangqiao village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan Province (河南省舞钢市洪河边的张桥村), a 45-year-old woman Sun Xiaojun (孙晓军) could not move her feet and hands since 4 years ago. The numerous hospital treatments were not effective. April 7, 2009


28. Zhaozhuang village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan province (河南省舞钢市洪河边的赵庄村), 66-year-old Zhao Bingkun suffering from esophageal cancer since 2004, after the second surgery, treatment cost already have reached over 200,000 yuan. His condition is in late stage, he is having fever everyday, waiting for death. April 7, 2009
 

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29. Zhaozhuang village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan province (洪河边的河南省西平县张于庄村), Gao Wanshun’s (高万顺) wife died of cancer. Now he lives in poverty. April 3, 2009


30. Linfen City in Shanxi province (山西临汾市) is seriously polluted area. Farmers after working in the cotton fields for 2 hours are filled with coal ashes. September 24 2007


31. Salt factory worker in Lianyungang, Jiangsu province (江苏连云港) said angrily, “when the wind blowing towards our side, the foul smell from the chemical factories is unbearable. There is even more poison gas at night.” July 19, 2008
 

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32. People form Fanjiazhuang (范家庄) are ready to submit a complain filled with their fingerprints, to seek compensation for pollution damages. March 19, 2008


33. In Shanxi Province there are a lot of charitable nursing homes, to help disabled infants abandoned by their parents. April 14, 2009


34. Liujiawan village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan province (河南省舞钢市洪河边的刘家湾村), 13 year old Yang Xiao in November 2008 was ill with obscure disease. She was saved by the donation of the villagers. When the grandmother saw the old village chief came to visit his granddaughter, she kneeled on the ground holding granddaughter’s hand. April 19, 2009
 

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the human cost


35. The oldest is 9, not going to school. The youngest is less than 2 years old. They lived in severely polluted area. They hands and faces were always dirty. April 10, 2005


36. Mazhuang village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan province, (河南省舞钢市洪河边的马庄村) 58-year-old Ma Haipeng (马海朋) was suffering from stomach cancer since 2006 and could not work in the field. He must take medicine every day, otherwise it is too painful. April 6, 2009


37. Every year, a lot of deficiency babies in Shanxi Province were abandoned. Kong Zhenlan (孔贞兰) in Qi town (祁县) who was making a living by recycling trash adopted 25 abandoned children. April 14, 2009
 

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rampant cancer


38. Xuanwei (宣威) in Yunnan province is a cancer village. Every year there are more than 20 people die of cancer. 11-year-old student Xu Li (徐丽) is suffering from bone cancer. May 8, 2007


39. In Shexian Village, Hebei Province, (河北省涉县固新村) the existing cancer patients are more than 50 people and more than 20 cancer patients die each year. March 18, 2008


40. Zhangyuzhuan village by the Hong River in Xiping county, Henan province, (河南省西平县洪河边的张于庄村) 22-year-old Zhu Xiaoyan (朱小燕) had a tumor in her stomach in 2007. She died after number of hospital treatments on July 2008. 4-year-old girl with her grandfather came to mother’s tomb. April 2009
 

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Interview with Lu Guang, the photographer of “Pollution in China”

all pictures from: Amazing Pictures, Pollution in China | ChinaHush


On October 21st 2009 I posted “Amazing Pictures, Pollution in China” featuring the winner of W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography, Lu Guang’s documentary project “Pollution in China”. This post was an instant sensation that attracted viewers from all over the world. In less than 20 days, this post was viewed by over 475,000 unique visitors in 204 countries with over 510,000 page views. As for today it had 3,327 retweets on twitter and 929 comments. Thank you everyone! It was both surprising and inspiring to see how much people around the world cared about the pollution issues in China and the environment of the planet earth. And of course Lu Guang’s haunting photos were truly breathtaking. His artistic and insightful work of art exposed real urgent issues of people living at the bottom of the society in China, the side of China people of the world usually don’t get to see.

But how did Lu Guang take these photos? And what was his experience going to the polluted areas? Lu Guang shared some insights in an Interview with NetEease. The topic of the talk focused on what was behind those photos – the residents living in those polluted areas. As a photographer who directly contacted and interacted with these villagers, Lu Guang described how the villagers saw the pollution issues.

NetEase: Where did you get the funding for your project?

Lu Guang: They were my savings. I am different from other people, I make 50,0000 and fell it’s enough, other people make 100,000, 1,000,000 still don’t feel enough, and still continue to make more money. But my thinking is different from other people, I wish my life to be simpler, for example yesterday I could have flown back, how much would it have been? 690. How much was it taking the train? 210 yuan for the whole night, for sure I chose the train. Considering my health, I should have taken the plane, but I don’t have that much money. I must save money when I can. For example, other people stayed at hotels that cost 200, 300, 500 (yuan), the hotels I stayed at were all under 100 (yuan).

NetEase: How did you find and choose the locations of your photos?

Lu Guang: The information was all provided by friends.

NetEase: There are many polluted places, how do you choose the order of your visits?

Lu Guang: Continuously travel and constantly work. Every place I went, there were always friends helping me, I gave my phone number to him, he also gave me his. Whenever something happened over there, he would call me, and I would go over there right the way. Of course there were times I couldn’t make it over there.

NetEase: You said you ate and lived with the villagers, what were most of the reactions of the villagers living in polluted villages when talking about pollution?

Lu Guang: Whenever talking about pollution, they would become very talkative.

NetEase: They want to tell you things?

Lu Guang: Yes, including “Hong River flows through here, 20 years ago the river was very nice, there were fishes, we all bathed in the river, and used water to irrigate wheat, but now we cannot do that anymore. And for so many years we have talked about it many times. We reported to the government, but nothing was ever resolved. Therefore we are now numb and don’t want to complain it anymore.” They were very miserable.

NetEase: The places you shot at where you think the pollution was very serious, how did the villagers see the pollution in their lives? Did they feel the pollution was very serious and threatening their lives or (that the polluting industries) driving the local economic development was more important?

Lu Guang: In fact, there is no economic development for them, it only brought them destructions. Back then they had fertile fields. There were many water conservancy facilities built in the 70’s, all were every good, used to irrigate the fields. But now, pollution came and the water could not be used to irrigate the fields anymore. After a long time, now all the water conservancy facilities are wastes. The polluted water has led to contamination of the underground water. All their drinking water is underground water, water in the wells or from the water tower. Water from water tower flows straight to their homes, unlike us, the tap water we drink is already processed. Drinking this kind of water for long time, many people got very ill. I interviewed a village 3-5 kilo-meters away from Hong River village and asked them if there were people with cancer there. They said yes, but only 1-2 in couple years, and very few. However (in Hong River Village), they have a dozen in each year. The difference is obvious from the same district.

NetEase: How did Hong River (region) village head see the water pollution in his own village?

Lu Guang: This is not their problem because it is upstream, a county, a city where people dump sewage and flow to them. What I am talking about is (Hong River region) Zhang Yu Zhuang village. The head of the village was very helpless, they repeatedly reported the issue to the town and county government, but it was never resolved. Even the county could not resolve it because the water is not dumped by them, it was another county, another city that was dumping sewage, they couldn’t do anything.

NetEase: if factories were set up in those areas, the villagers who benefit from it, for example family member works at the factory, what are their attitudes (of pollution)?

Lu Guang: The same, they are like this – happy about the economic development, but against the severe pollution. The best would be to reduce pollution and continuously develop industries. For example village has a lot of empty houses. 100 yuan for each room, rent out 3 rooms is 300 yuan. Some of them also can work at the factories, to them these increase in their income is very good. But pollution to them is, close the door then go to sleep in the room, the next morning their faces are all gray. They know if this keeps up, their lives will not be very long, very soon …

NetEase: How does the county government see the polluting?

Lu Guang: They are already numb, they cannot do anything. So many young people all have escaped and did not want to return. Young people going out to work all did not want to come back, many lived outside.

NetEase: Living in polluted areas, what specific actions reflect these villagers’ environmental awareness?

Lu Guang: The villagers have no way of protecting the environment. They are the victims, drinking contaminated water every day. They have no choice, unlike wealthy people can buy mineral water, they cannot afford it.

NetEase: What do you think the crux of pollution is? What is the root cause?

Lu Guang: The root cause of pollution is (businesses) want to get more profits, business owners want to get more profits, put aside their own moral and destroy environment. They gained more profits, and that’s it.

NetEase: Is it that they don’t have the rights to hold talks equally? The polluter and the people do not have the equal rights to communicate?

Lu Guang: Who do you talk to? They let you talk? Do you know what they see the farmers as? I should bring you to see what kind of people farmers are. I am telling you, they totally look down on the famers, the true poor people. When you go to the front line you will feel it, the local farmers are suffering in poverty. The right to talk is not for them, it is for the rich people. They (the rich) got the right to talk, not the famers.

NetEase: You took so many pictures of pollution, what do you think the best solution for pollution is?

Lu Guang: If China really wants to solve the pollution problem, I personally feel that it does not depend on a few people from Environmental Protection Administration (EPA), nor relying on the public to report. I personally think that it is a matter of law, because in China’s “Environmental Protection Law”, the maximum fine is 500,000 yuan, with no criminal responsibility. For a company with couple tens and hundreds of millions yearly profit, what is 500,000? Go ahead fine me, it’s ok, because the cost of processing sewage is not 500,000, maybe is millions, it’s ok to give you 500,000. Therefore it is useless to only impose a fine. It is necessary to hold criminal responsibility and to develop more strict laws.

As a legal representative, an owner, if strict laws target him, he will certainly care more about his business. There is no need for the EPA and supervision by the public. If companies who were found of dumping illegally or reported by someone of polluting get the prosecution sentencing, no one will dare to do it anymore. Just because our law is weak right now, the fines are no big deals to the companies. They will pay you as much fines as you want.

NetEase: Do you feel that your photographs have impacts (on people)?

Lu Guang: As for the impacts of my photographs, in fact I didn’t feel it when I was shooting them.

NetEase: Social impact.


Lu Guang: Yes, no feeling. This time I did not create the impact, it was the media. When I shot them I followed my own ideas to take the pictures, to do a good job, so that more people know the truth. What you said impact is because netizens are concerned; very concerned about the pollution issue in China, which shows that Chinese people are very concerned. (Key: I wish he know about ChinaHush and see how many people from other countries were more concerned) This is everyone’s life, environmental issues, the earth is everyone’s, is human’s therefore everyone was very concerned.

NetEase: What role do you think W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography played?

Lu Guang: Eugene Smith is a photographer, an American. In the 70’s he took a set of photos on the mist in Japan which changed Japanese people’s view on environmental pollution issues. In the 70’s Japan also had terrible pollution problems. Because of the social impact of this set of photos, they completely changed the Japan’s environmental pollution problems. They carried out this award, I thought maybe this set of my photos were similar to his. As for this award, I think there are 2 points. One, it recognized my work in the past years. Two, this set of photos will attract more people’s attention worldwide.

NetEase: Are you now the first person to know information on the pollution situation in the villages?

Lu Guang: Yes, my information comes very fast, because they will call me, and if I want to know information about a particular place, I can call them to find out everything. But I want to say one thing, actually the pollutions I documented was only a very small part in China. There are many places I did not discover and did not take photos of, therefore I have many work to do. Now what I did was three rivers, Huai River, the Yangtze River and Yellow river. But there are Hai River, Liao River, Songhua River, Pearl River, these four rivers also were heavily polluted, I still did not go there yet. Because the power of one person is limited, time is limited. Maybe my focus of future work will be those.

NetEase: Looking forward to more of your work.
 

Emperor

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Well, with the consideration of the present day levels of pollution in all the industrial regions in China, it is said that China will find it hard to get pure drinking water after 10 years.Almost 70% of their revers and underground water resources were completely polluted.And soon the remaining 30% will be polluted in the next 10 years,the 1.3 billion may find it hard to survive even though a pile of 2 trillion forex may not help out.And if a cleaning process of rivers and lakes starts today they may drink fresh water at 15 years atleast.A friend of mine who went to Beijing recently returned home being sick after breathing the polluted air in and around the city.Outsiders will definitely get ill if they live atleast 2 days and wander atleast 4hrs/day outside.since the local immune system is kinda adjusted to the local conditions their bodies can take the bad for a while.But soon the toxic levels in their body reaches the red mark,people will die like pests falling down from the crop.
All this is not just to point the level of living in such harsh conditions.It has to be an eye opener to the gov there.
 

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Polluted minds, polluted nation.

We are happy with less exports and dirty everything in india, but we dont want this kind of development here.
 

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