Pollution in China

I was working in Beijing in 2002, and the city was so polluted, it made my eyes burn. And I was a heavy smoker at the time.
 
yep, agreed, you can see this stuff everywhere in the world, oilsand mining in Canada, battery and tyre manufacturing in US, here ,there and everywhere. And think about how long we in the `developed world' have been doing this and how long the greens have been ridiculed for pointing this out- ridiculed by certain generations that is.
Just one of my pet subjects to rant on. regards
 
pakeha said:
yep, agreed, you can see this stuff everywhere in the world, oilsand mining in Canada, battery and tyre manufacturing in US, here ,there and everywhere. And think about how long we in the `developed world' have been doing this and how long the greens have been ridiculed for pointing this out- ridiculed by certain generations that is.
Just one of my pet subjects to rant on. regards
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But our problems in the US and Canada began at a time when no one knew any better, and much was done in the second half of the 20th century to clean up the mess. It is now 2009, and China is aware of the harm they are causing, but they simply don't care.

Do you own anything made in China? I would be willing to bet that some of the clothing you are wearing now says "Made in China" somewhere on it.

I'm not a "green", but I dislike China's environmental and human rights policies, and I practice what I preach. I also dislike the West's outsourcing their manufacturing to China. I look at the labels of everything I buy, if it says "Made in China", I'll put it back.
 
damn big praise to Lu Guang for getting this project out, winning the W. Eugene Smith prize and producing some heart wrenching images!
 
big praise indeed, this quality of work can in the long run make a difference and it takes some courage in certain countries to do.

quote
But our problems in the US and Canada began at a time when no one knew any better, and much was done in the second half of the 20th century to clean up the mess. It is now 2009, and China is aware of the harm they are causing, but they simply don't care.

Do you own anything made in China? I would be willing to bet that some of the clothing you are wearing now says "Made in China" somewhere on it.

I'm not a "green", but I dislike China's environmental and human rights policies, and I practice what I preach. I also dislike the West's outsourcing their manufacturing to China. I look at the labels of everything I buy, if it says "Made in China", I'll put it back.

Deal me in, im wearing Hemp and what is a "green"? we don`t need the "..":D
 
1.3 billion people and not enough resources. After 40 years of isolation they finally woke up and decided they needed to catch up so they adopted capitalism at its most brutal form. No health care, no social safety net, no free education, no nothing. Do or die for all who lives there.
 
Seeing these photos my only hope is that China wakes up before it is to late ... The price they will pay for this kind of "economical growth" is very high ...
 
Rayt said:
... No health care, no social safety net, no free education, no nothing. ...
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Pollution is a serious problem in parts of China (although certainly not all). I lived in Shanghai for 5 years, and the pollution in that city isn't all that bad, and improved each and every year I lived there. Most of the pollution was caused by automobiles and construction; which is similar to many US large cities such as Los Angeles. At any rate, what doesn't help the issue is confusing the issues with factual errors such as the ones you are spreading in the quoted sentence. For citizens with a valid hukou, none of the above is true.
 
I think the situation is appalling. But to be fair, if the US had cared about the environment when we were a "developing" industrial nation, we would have never achieved what we achieved. Environmental concerns would have stopped industrial development in its tracks. It's nice to look back and say, "If we had known then what we know now, we would have done it differently," but that's nonsense. We couldn't have done it differently.

While I believe what China is doing is disastrous, it's the only path to where they want to be. It seems a bit unfair to blame them for taking the same path we took.
 
It's very difficult to get through the day without encountering a product made in China. From consumer electronics (VCRs, TVs, digital cameras and computers) to hand tools to furniture to clothes to container ships, China has become the source for lower-cost goods.

Americans in general don't really care about the ecological effects of what happens in China. I almost always check the label when I buy something. I've given up on trying to avoid "Made in China" goods.

When I lived in Hong Kong, the air was almost always cleaner on Chinese national holidays. A friend of mine said it was because the mainland factories had shut down.

China's communist regime has turned out to be as greedy -- or even moreso -- as the capitalists.
 
I suppose that it is for dramatic effect or other artistic reasons, but these picks all seem to be way too dark, either underexposed, printed too dark or tweaked in software to lower brightness.

A sad situation, but it helps to remind me that until a certain level of economic development is achieved, caring for the environment is often seen as a low priority.
 
dfoo said:
Pollution is a serious problem in parts of China (although certainly not all). I lived in Shanghai for 5 years, and the pollution in that city isn't all that bad, and improved each and every year I lived there. Most of the pollution was caused by automobiles and construction; which is similar to many US large cities such as Los Angeles. At any rate, what doesn't help the issue is confusing the issues with factual errors such as the ones you are spreading in the quoted sentence. For citizens with a valid hukou, none of the above is true.
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Agreed. Although, northern china is not particularly pollution free.

I have spent the past eight years going back and forth to China, living months at a time in Beijing, and living in Inner Mongolia (the province of China, not the country: standard answer. Nobody seems to know this) for most of 2008.

In northern china, much of the "pollution" is dust from the gobi. I could go on for a while about how this came to be created, but it is man made. Not a modern problem, but exacerbated during our lifetimes. It does make for fantastic light in Beijing.

In addition to that, a large portion of the energy is derived from the burning of coal, often in open fires. It is quite common to see compressed coal being shuttled around via truck and bicycle, this is used for cooking and heating in the poorer sections of Beijing (and all of Inner Mongolia: although they use chunks of coal, since it is one of the couple of provinces where it comes from).

The smoke stacks in the pictures are probably coal fired power plants.

Over the time that I have been visiting China, the pollution has gotten significantly better. Modernization was the initial goal for China, but lately the government has been attempting to put the environment further up the importance ladder.

At the very least, they are attempting to reduce the dependence on small, very dirty, coal fired power plants. Instead attempting to expand the cleaner larger plants. These, at least, have some stack gas scrubbers / NOx and SOx removal capabilities, and particulate removal.
 
ZeissFan said:
When I lived in Hong Kong, the air was almost always cleaner on Chinese national holidays. A friend of mine said it was because the mainland factories had shut down.
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Beijing's air was beautiful for the Olympics. Well, for Beijing anyway. (I was transiting, not going to the games).
 
dexdog said:
I suppose that it is for dramatic effect or other artistic reasons, but these picks all seem to be way too dark, either underexposed, printed too dark or tweaked in software to lower brightness.

A sad situation, but it helps to remind me that until a certain level of economic development is achieved, caring for the environment is often seen as a low priority.
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or it could be the appalling conditions due to the pollution itself.
 
dexdog said:
I suppose that it is for dramatic effect or other artistic reasons, but these picks all seem to be way too dark, either underexposed, printed too dark or tweaked in software to lower brightness.
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Artistic decision: they look just right to me. They are darker than an automatic exposure, but that is fine.
 
the only difference between us and China is we prefer the environmental cost of our lives to be in others backyards.
 
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