Pollution in China - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Pollution
Pollution
Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into a natural environment that causes instability, disorder, harm or discomfort to the ecosystem i.e. physical systems or living organisms. Pollution can take the form of chemical substances or energy, such as noise, heat or light...

is causing serious problems in China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

.

Electronic waste

Electronic waste, e-waste, e-scrap, or Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment describes discarded electrical or electronic devices. There is a lack of consensus as to whether the term should apply to resale, reuse, and refurbishing industries, or only to product that cannot be used for its...

is being deported to China and is causing war, water and land based pollution. China is believed to be the dominant recipient of the world's electronic waste, with a roughly estimated one billion tons of electronic waste being shipped there per year, mostly from the United States, Canada and Japan. 90% of US e-waste is exported to China and Nigeria.

E-waste recycling operations are toxic and are usually conducted with bare skin; 88% of workers suffer from neurological or digestive abnormalities or skin diseases and many develop breathing problems. Besides skin contact with toxic materials, workers burn plastics coatings to separate them from metals, resulting in inhalation of poisonous gases. Workers also use highly corrosive and dangerous acid baths along the riverbanks to extract gold from the microchips. Residents of the areas surrounding the Guiyu e-waste village are exposed to the toxic ash and soil that is dumped by the rivers. Pools of toxins leach into the groundwater of Guiiyu, making it so polluted that the water is absolutely undrinkable (not even after having been boiled) and water must be trucked in from elsewhere. Lead levels in the river sediment are double the safety levels. Lead in the blood of Guiyu's children is 88% higher than in the average child. Guiyu is world's second most polluted spot, first being Lake Karachay

Lake Karachay

Lake Karachay , sometimes spelled Karachai, is a small lake in the southern Ural mountains in western Russia. Starting in 1951 the Soviet Union used Karachay as a dumping site for radioactive waste from Mayak, the nearby nuclear waste storage and reprocessing facility, located near the town of...

. Visitors to the city claim to still experience headaches and strange metallic tastes in the mouth due to the air pollution.

A recent study of the area evaluated the extent of heavy metal contamination from the site. Using dust samples, scientists analysed mean heavy metal concentrations in a Guiyu workshop and found that Lead and Copper were 371 and 115 times higher, respectively, than areas located 30 kilometers away. The same study revealed that sediment from the nearby Lianjiang River was found to be contaminated by polychlorinated byphenyls at a level three times greater than the guideline amount. Studies are underway to assess the extent to which chemicals like these maginify through bioaccumulation.

Industrial pollution

Industrial pollution has its most severe impact on the poor and in China, pollution incidents have been so serious as to be the cause of riot

Riot

A riot is a form of civil disorder characterized often by what is thought of as disorganized groups lashing out in a sudden and intense rash of violence against authority, property or people. While individuals may attempt to lead or control a riot, riots are thought to be typically chaotic and...

ing in recent years.

1997 World Bank report

In 1997, the World Bank issued a report targeting China's policy towards industrial pollution. The main summary points were:

There were "hundreds of thousands of premature deaths and incidents of serious respiratory illness caused by exposure to industrial air pollution"
"Seriously contaminated by industrial discharges, many of China's waterways are largely unfit for direct human use", but the World Bank report stressed that this problem can be avoided with moderate cost.
Continued economic development would make the pollution worse.
If the Chinese government refused to impose more powerful and more strict anti-pollution laws, "most of China's waterways will remain heavily polluted, and many thousands of people will die or suffer serious respiratory damage."
"The stakes are even higher for air pollution because regulatory enforcement has weakened in many areas in the past five years." China's National Environmental Protection Agency (NEPA) had recommended a tenfold increase in the air pollution levy, but the World Bank report recommended a fiftyfold increase in the levy. "Reducing emissions from large private plants is so cheap that only significant abatement makes sense – at least 70 percent abatement of sulfur dioxide particulates and even greater abatement of particulates in large urban industrial facilities."

International media report

Joseph Kahn and Jim Yardley of the New York Times filed a report on August 26, 2007 about China's pollution problem: "Environmental degradation is now so severe, with such stark domestic and international repercussions, that pollution poses not only a major long-term burden on the Chinese public but also an acute political challenge to the ruling Communist Party." Main points from the report included:

According to the Chinese Ministry of Health, industrial pollution has made cancer China’s leading cause of death.
Every year, ambient air pollution alone killed hundreds of thousands of citizens.
500 million people in China are without safe and clean drinking water.
Only 1% of the country’s 560 million city dwellers breathe air considered safe by the European Union, because all the China's major cities are constantly covered in a "toxic gray shroud". Before and during the 2008 Summer Olympics
2008 Summer Olympics
The 2008 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, was a major international multi-sport event that took place in Beijing, China, from August 8 to August 24, 2008. A total of 11,028 athletes from 204 National Olympic Committees competed in 28 sports and 302 events...

, Beijing was "frantically searching for a magic formula, a meteorological deus ex machina, to clear its skies for the 2008 Olympics."
Lead poisoning or other types of local pollution continue to kill many Chinese children.
A large section of the ocean is without marine life because of massive algal boom caused by the high nutrients in the water.
The pollution has spread internationally: sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides fall as acid rain on Seoul, South Korea, and Tokyo; and according to the Journal of Geophysical Research, the pollution even reaches Los Angeles in the USA.
The Chinese Academy of Environmental Planning in 2003 had an internal and unpublished report which estimated that 300,000 people die each year from ambient air pollution, mostly of heart disease and lung cancer.
Chinese environmental experts in 2005 issued another report, estimating that annual premature deaths attributable to outdoor air pollution were likely to reach 380,000 in 2010 and 550,000 in 2020.
A 2007 World Bank report concluded "...outdoor air pollution was already causing 350,000 to 400,000 premature deaths a year. Indoor pollution contributed to the deaths of an additional 300,000 people, while 60,000 died from diarrhea, bladder and stomach cancer and other diseases that can be caused by water-borne pollution." World Bank officials said "China’s environmental agency insisted that the health statistics be removed from the published version of the report, citing the possible impact on 'social stability'".

The report Mother river claimed that severe pollution has made one-third of China's Yellow River

Yellow River

The Yellow River or Huang He, formerly known as the Hwang Ho, is the second-longest river in China and the sixth-longest in the world at the estimated length of . Originating in the Bayan Har Mountains in Qinghai Province in western China, it flows through nine provinces of China and empties into...

unusable even for agricultural or industrial use, because of factory discharges and sewage from fast-expanding cities.

The survey, based on data taken last year, covered more than 8,384 miles of the river, one of the longest waterways in the world, and its tributaries.

The Yellow River Conservancy Committee, in 2007 surveyed more than 8,384 miles of the river, said 33.8% of the river system registered worse than level five. According to criteria used by the UN Environment Program, level five is unfit for drinking, aquaculture, industrial use and even agriculture.

The report said waste and sewage discharged into the system last year totaled 4.29bn tonnes. Industry and manufacturing made up 70% of the discharge into the river, with households accounting for 23% and just over 6% coming from other sources.

Water pollution

Approximately 300 million nationwide have no access to clean water. Furthermore, over 700 million Chinese drink fetid water below World Health Organization

World Health Organization

The World Health Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations that acts as a coordinating authority on international public health. Established on 7 April 1948, with headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, the agency inherited the mandate and resources of its predecessor, the Health...

standards. Almost 90% of underground water in cities are affected by pollution and 80% of China’s rivers fail to meet standards for fishing. Almost all of the nation's rivers are considered polluted to some degree, and half of the population lacks access to clean drinking water

Drinking water

Drinking water or potable water is water pure enough to be consumed or used with low risk of immediate or long term harm. In most developed countries, the water supplied to households, commerce and industry is all of drinking water standard, even though only a very small proportion is actually...

. Ninety percent of urban water bodies are severely polluted. Water scarcity also is an issue; for example, severe water scarcity in Northern China is a serious threat to sustained economic growth and has forced the government to begin implementing a large-scale diversion of water from the Yangtze River

Yangtze River

The Yangtze, Yangzi or Cháng Jiāng is the longest river in Asia, and the third-longest in the world. It flows for from the glaciers on the Tibetan Plateau in Qinghai eastward across southwest, central and eastern China before emptying into the East China Sea at Shanghai. It is also one of the...

to northern cities, including Beijing

Beijing

Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...

and Tianjin

Tianjin

' is a metropolis in northern China and one of the five national central cities of the People's Republic of China. It is governed as a direct-controlled municipality, one of four such designations, and is, thus, under direct administration of the central government...

.

For the 2008 Summer Olympics

2008 Summer Olympics

The 2008 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, was a major international multi-sport event that took place in Beijing, China, from August 8 to August 24, 2008. A total of 11,028 athletes from 204 National Olympic Committees competed in 28 sports and 302 events...

, China diverted water from Hebei and Shanxi provinces, areas already beset by drought and dramatic water shortages to Beijing. In July 2008, the head of the Beijing Water Authority Bi Xiaogang denied that the Olympics will increase water consumption by a large amount. However, previously he and other local officials said that Beijing would divert up to 400 million cubic meters of water from Hebei for the Games with water-diversion facilities and pipes been built to pump water from four reservoirs in Hebei. Around Baoding city alone, a mostly rural area, 31,000 residents have lost land and their homes because of a water transfer project; many more have been displaced throughout Hebei. According to an August 24, 2008 report by the UK’s Times, much of the infrastructure intended for the water diversion scheme was left half-constructed or un-used when Beijing officials realized that water demand estimates had been far too high. The number of tourists attending the Beijing games was lower than expected, and many migrant workers, ethnic minorities, and political dissidents had left the city because of intimidation or official requests. Nevertheless, the Hebei area had already been sucked dry to fill a number of large reservoirs, leading to drought and agricultural losses.

An explosion at a petrochemical plant

2005 Jilin chemical plant explosions

The Jilin chemical plant explosions were a series of explosions which occurred on November 13, 2005, in the No.101 Petrochemical Plant in Jilin City, Jilin Province, China, over the period of an hour...

in Jilin City

Jilin City

Jilin City is the second largest city of Jilin province in Northeast China. At the 2010 census, 4,414,681 people resided within its administrative area of and 1,975,803 in its built up area...

on November 13, 2005 caused a large discharge of nitrobenzene

Nitrobenzene

Nitrobenzene is an organic compound with the chemical formula C6H5NO2. It is a water-insoluble pale yellow oil with an almond-like odor. It freezes to give greenish-yellow crystals. It is produced on a large scale as a precursor to aniline. Although occasionally used as a flavoring or perfume...

into the Songhua River

Songhua River

The Songhua or Sunggari River is a river in Northeast China, and is the largest tributary of the Heilong River , flowing about from Changbai Mountains through Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces. The river drains of land, and has an annual discharge of .As the Second Songhua River, it joins the...

. Levels of the carcinogen

Carcinogen

A carcinogen is any substance, radionuclide, or radiation that is an agent directly involved in causing cancer. This may be due to the ability to damage the genome or to the disruption of cellular metabolic processes...

were so high that the entire water supply to Harbin

Harbin

Harbin ; Manchu language: , Harbin; Russian: Харби́н Kharbin ), is the capital and largest city of Heilongjiang Province in Northeast China, lying on the southern bank of the Songhua River...

city (pop 3.8M) was cut off for five days between November 21, 2005 and November 26, 2005, though it was only on November 23 that officials admitted that a severe pollution incident was the reason for the cutoff.

The responsibility for dealing with water is split between several agencies within the government. Water pollution is the responsibility of the environmental authorities, but the water supply

Water supply

Water supply is the provision of water by public utilities, commercial organisations, community endeavours or by individuals, usually via a system of pumps and pipes...

itself is managed by the Ministry of Water Resources. Sewage treatment

Sewage treatment

Sewage treatment, or domestic wastewater treatment, is the process of removing contaminants from wastewater and household sewage, both runoff and domestic. It includes physical, chemical, and biological processes to remove physical, chemical and biological contaminants...

is managed by the Ministry of Construction, but groundwater

Groundwater

Groundwater is water located beneath the ground surface in soil pore spaces and in the fractures of rock formations. A unit of rock or an unconsolidated deposit is called an aquifer when it can yield a usable quantity of water. The depth at which soil pore spaces or fractures and voids in rock...

management falls within the realm of the Ministry of Land and Resources. China grades its water quality

Water quality

Water quality is the physical, chemical and biological characteristics of water. It is a measure of the condition of water relative to the requirements of one or more biotic species and or to any human need or purpose. It is most frequently used by reference to a set of standards against which...

in six levels, from Grade I to Grade VI, with Grade VI being the most highest polluted.

Air pollution

According to the People's Republic of China's own evaluation, two-thirds of the 338 cities for which air-quality data are available are considered 'moderately' or 'severely' polluted. Respiratory, Cancer and heart disease

Heart disease

Heart disease, cardiac disease or cardiopathy is an umbrella term for a variety of diseases affecting the heart. , it is the leading cause of death in the United States, England, Canada and Wales, accounting for 25.4% of the total deaths in the United States.-Types:-Coronary heart disease:Coronary...

s related to air pollution

Air pollution

Air pollution is the introduction of chemicals, particulate matter, or biological materials that cause harm or discomfort to humans or other living organisms, or cause damage to the natural environment or built environment, into the atmosphere....

are the leading cause of death in China. Acid rain

Acid rain

Acid rain is a rain or any other form of precipitation that is unusually acidic, meaning that it possesses elevated levels of hydrogen ions . It can have harmful effects on plants, aquatic animals, and infrastructure. Acid rain is caused by emissions of carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen...

falls on 30% of the country. China's environmental laws are among the strictest in the world, but enforcing these laws has been difficult in China. The World Health Organization

World Health Organization

has found that about 750,000 people die prematurely each year from respiratory problems in China.

According to the World Bank, the cities with the highest levels of particulate matter in the PRC in 2004 were Tianjin, Chongqing, and Shenyang. These were among the ten most polluted cities in the world by this measure.

During the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, air pollution was more closely monitored and (especially in Beijing itself) more and stricter measures were being taken. The monitoring of the air quality was done by the European Space Agency

European Space Agency

The European Space Agency , established in 1975, is an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to the exploration of space, currently with 18 member states...

and the Ministry of Science and Technology, in their "Dragon Programme". In this programme, data from the SCIAMACHY-spectrometer aboard the ENVISAT

Envisat

Envisat is an Earth-observing satellite. It was launched on 1 March 2002 aboard an Ariane 5 from the Guyana Space Centre in Kourou, French Guyana into a Sun synchronous polar orbit at an altitude of...

was combined with the AURORA

Aurora

Aurora most commonly refers to:*Aurora , a glow in the sky seen at polar latitudes*Aurora , the goddess of the dawn in Roman mythologyAurora may also refer to:-Literature:*Aurora , a superheroine in the Marvel Universe...

-airqualitymodel.

The US embassy in Beijing regularly posts automated air quality measurements at . On 18 November 2010, the feed described the PM2.5 measurement as "crazy bad" after registering a reading in excess of 500 for the first time. This description was later changed to "beyond index", a level which recurred in February 2011.

Pollution ratings in China

The top five environmentally friendly cities: Haikou
Haikou
Hǎikǒu , is the capital and most populous city of Hainan Province, in the People's Republic of China. It is situated on the northern coast of Hainan, by the mouth of the Nandu River...

, Zhuhai
Zhuhai
Zhuhai is a prefecture-level city on the southern coast of Guangdong province in the People's Republic of China. Located in the Pearl River Delta, Zhuhai borders Jiangmen to the northwest, Zhongshan to the north, and Macau to the south. Zhuhai was one of the original Special Economic Zones...

, Zhanjiang
Zhanjiang
Zhanjiang , formerly known as Tsamkong, Tsankiang, Fort-Bayard, and Kwang-Chou-Wan, is a prefecture-level city at the southwestern end of Guangdong province of Southern China, facing the island of Hainan to the south....

, Guilin
Guilin
Guilin is a prefecture-level city in the northeast of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of far southern China, sitting on the west bank of the Li River. Its name means "forest of Sweet Osmanthus", owing to the large number of fragrant Sweet Osmanthus trees located in the city...

, Beihai
Beihai
Beihai is a prefecture-level city of Guangxi, China. Beihai means "north of the sea" in Chinese, signifying its status as a seaport on the north shore of the Gulf of Tonkin. Between the years 2006 and 2020, Beihai is predicted to be the world's fastest growing city...
The top five cities with most effective pollution controls: Nantong
Nantong
Nantong is a prefecture-level city in Jiangsu province, People's Republic of China. Located on the northern bank of the Yangtze River, near the river mouth, Nantong is a vital river port bordering Yancheng to the north, Taizhou to the west, Suzhou and Shanghai to the south across the river, and...

, Lianyungang
Lianyungang
Lianyungang is a prefecture-level city in northeastern Jiangsu province, People's Republic of China. It borders Yancheng to its southeast, Huai'an and Suqian to its south, Xuzhou to its southwest, and the province of Shandong to its north...

, Shenyang
Shenyang
Shenyang , or Mukden , is the capital and largest city of Liaoning Province in Northeast China. Currently holding sub-provincial administrative status, the city was once known as Shengjing or Fengtianfu...

, Suzhou
Suzhou
Suzhou , previously transliterated as Su-chou, Suchow, and Soochow, is a major city located in the southeast of Jiangsu Province in Eastern China, located adjacent to Shanghai Municipality. The city is situated on the lower reaches of the Yangtze River and on the shores of Taihu Lake and is a part...

, Fuzhou
Fuzhou
Fuzhou is the capital and one of the largest cities in Fujian Province, People's Republic of China. Along with the many counties of Ningde, those of Fuzhou are considered to constitute the Mindong linguistic and cultural area....
The 10 cities with worst air quality: Linfen
Linfen
-Administrative divisions:The prefecture-level city of Linfen is divided in one district, two cities and fourteen counties. The information here presented uses the metric system and data from 2010 Census.-Pollution:...

, Yangquan
Yangquan
Yangquan is a prefecture-level city in the Shanxi province of China. Situated to the west side of Taihang Mountain, Yangquan occupies a total area of 4,470 square kilometers and is home to a population of about 1.3 million . Yangquan is rich in mineral resources and is famous for its smokeless coal...

, Datong
Datong
Datong is a prefecture-level city in northern Shanxi Province of North China, located a few hundred kilometres west by rail from Beijing with an elevation of...

, Shizuishan, Sanmenxia
Sanmenxia
-Administration:The prefecture-level city of Sanmenxia administers one district, two county-level cities and three counties.*Hubin District*Lingbao City*Yima City*Lushi County*Shan County*Mianchi County*Sanmenxia Development Zone...

, Jinchang
Jinchang
Jinchang is a prefecture-level city in China's Gansu province.-Geography and climate:Jinchang City is located in central Gansu province, west of the Yellow River, north of the Qilian Mountains, and south of the Alashan Plateau. The southwest of the city borders Qinghai Province and the northwest...

, Shijiazhuang
Shijiazhuang
Shijiazhuang is the capital and largest city of North China's Hebei province. Administratively a prefecture-level city, it is about south of Beijing...

, Xi An, Zhuzhou
Zhuzhou
Zhuzhou , formerly Jianning, is a city in Hunan Province, China, southeast of Changsha beside the Xiangjiang River. It is part of the "ChangZhuTan Golden Triangle"...

, Luoyang
Luoyang
Luoyang is a prefecture-level city in western Henan province of Central China. It borders the provincial capital of Zhengzhou to the east, Pingdingshan to the southeast, Nanyang to the south, Sanmenxia to the west, Jiyuan to the north, and Jiaozuo to the northeast.Situated on the central plain of...
The Chinese cities Linfen
Linfen
-Administrative divisions:The prefecture-level city of Linfen is divided in one district, two cities and fourteen counties. The information here presented uses the metric system and data from 2010 Census.-Pollution:...

and Tianying
Tianying
Tianying Town part of the city Jieshou , which belongs to the prefecture-level city Fuyang, which is in the northwest of Anhui Province. The town has 26,095 inhabitants according to the 2001 census....

are the two world's most polluted cities according to Time Magazine

External links

Articles

Cleaner Production in China - Current and comprehensive information source on China's campaign to reduce pollution
Photo essay on water pollution in Huai River Basin
Most polluted cities in China
Clearing the Air: China's Environmental Challenge - Asia Society - Overview on China air pollution problem
Documentary project “Pollution in China.”

Videos

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