About China --Article From TamilYoungsters

DEADLY POWER PLANT By the time you read this, this young Chinese man will probably no longer be working at the coal-fi red power plant in Wuhai. After just one to two years his lungs will be so damaged by the hazardous emissions that he’ll be unfit for work. Many end up dying of cancer.

Arsenic, lead, mercury – China spews countless tonnes of toxic waste into the environment every year. Winds and currents then spread this poisonous cocktail around the entire globe, with catastrophic consequences. Even Australia isn’t safe from China’s deadliest export…

Parkdale, an idyllic village situated in the dense forests of Oregon: David is 14 years old, and a war is being waged inside his body. Large parts of his insides are being eaten away, with the corrosion particularly devastating in his brain and kidneys. The culprit? Five micrograms of mercury, which is seeping into his organs via his bloodstream. A highly toxic heavy metal, mercury destroys proteins, the building blocks of the body. David has been absorbing it through his lungs, his skin and his stomach since the day he was born, leaving him with irreparable brain damage. Astonishingly, the source of the mercury ravaging David’s body is almost 10,000 kilometers away from Oregon.

IS THE WORLD PAYING FOR CHINA’S ECONOMIC BOOM? Around 50% of mercury pollution can be traced back to China, according to a study by the World Bank. Much of it forms into toxic clouds which then rain down across North America. Researchers are fi nding more than 20 micrograms of mercury per square metre in rural Oregon alone. Nobody is entirely certain how many US citizens have been affected by this chronic mercury poisoning. One thing is certain, however: they’re all casualties of China’s incredible economic boom. Predictably, China is falling victim to its own pollution. No other country on the planet produces as much rubbish or as many hazardous toxins, and its air is now so polluted that many experts use the term “airpocalypse” to describe it.

WHAT TOXINS DOES CHINA SPREAD ACROSS THE GLOBE? Although the problem has been widely recognised for some time, it’s only quite recently that studies have revealed the full extent of China’s poison-boom, and its disastrous effects. China’s industrial production results in over one billion tonnes of environmental toxins being created every year – absolutely record-breaking. Among the toxins are arsenic, lead, nitrobenzene, ammonia, sodium fl uoride, trifl uralin, ammonium, mercury, methylene chloride, tetrachloroethylene and dioxin. These toxins are spread by ocean and air currents. During January 2013, China’s pollution could even be seen from space: a thick cloud of smog hung over the north-east of the country for weeks. And where is that cloud today, exactly? Answer: it’s spread across the entire planet. Wind systems carry the toxins eastwards, mostly, across the Pacifi c Ocean to the US and even Europe.

SOURCE OF RADIATION:-This steel factory in Tianjin is one of 800 across China. They’re the main producers of smog and emit radioactive thorium, among other things.

Little research has been done into the effects of Chinese pollution on the Australian environment, but our latitude and pervading weather systems mean we probably get off lightly. More concerning, though, is Australia’s growing reliance on Chinese food imports – currently about 8% of our total intake – with hundreds of millions of dollars worth of Chinese fruit, vegetables and processed meals ending up on dinner tables. Environmental laws in China are lax. According to a study by the Chinese government, around 70% of the country’s farmland is contaminated. Many of the toxins end up seeping into the groundwater; others spread into the crops themselves. “You can walk into any supermarket around Australia and you’ll fi nd a whole range of imported food,” science author Julian Cribb told the ABC. “They haven’t been checked, you don’t know what’s in them. We know from American and European surveys that there are a lot of pesticides and chemicals… and not just from the food itself but from the wrapping and things like that.”

USELESS PROTECTION Visibility is at a maximum of ten metres in the thick smog of Harbin. This man’s protective facemask is virtually useless: the microscopic, noxious particles will still make it into his airways.

HOW DIRTY IS CHINA’S BOOM? China’s industry generates more than $4.7 trillion per year. By contrast, Australia’s entire manufacturing industry only generates about $100 billion. The top fi ve industries in China are textiles, chemicals, electronics, steel and mining. Altogether, they produce roughly one billion tonnes of toxic waste every year, and since the country has virtually no environmental laws – and nobody adheres to the ones that do exist – most of it ends up, unfi ltered, in the environment. From there, it spreads across the entire planet: wastewater travels down the rivers and out into the ocean, while wind currents carry waste gases primarily eastwards. There’s also indirect pollution: contaminated water, acid rain and pathogenic pesticides leach into the soil – 70% of China’s farmland is considered contaminated – and are absorbed by crops and animals, which are then exported globally. HOW MANY MORE POWER PLANTS ARE IN THE PIPELINE? A total of 570 new coal-fi red power plants are currently being built or planned. That would almost double China’s energy production – and its toxic emissions. These power plants are viewed as the engines of China’s many factories, as they supply their electricity. HOW MANY DEATHS ARE CAUSED BY THE RELENTLESS SMOG? It’s mostly China’s 620 coal-fi red power plants that keep the smog clouds expanding at incredible rates. According to one study, these plants were responsible for the premature deaths of 260,000 Chinese people in 2011. HOW BIG CAN A TOXIC CLOUD BECOME? Again and again, gigantic smog clouds collect over mainland China. Some of them are six times the size of Victoria, and are even visible from space. Despite the Chinese government’s enforcement of driving bans and temporary work stoppages, the smog hardly ever dissipates.

WHY ARE SO MANY CHINESE PEOPLE DEVELOPING CANCER? To get an idea of how this planet-wide poisoning could impact us all, take a look at Xuanwei, a city of 1.3 million inhabitants located in southern China. At the city’s edge lies a place that’s been labelled a “cancer village”; here, an unusually large proportion of the population are seriously ill. Among them is 11-year-old Xu Li. His legs are so deformed that he can barely walk – Xu has bone cancer. His chances of survival are virtually nil. His native city is renowned, above all else, for its many chemical factories They emit CO2 and nitrogen oxide (NOx), which produce smog, acid rain, and holes in the ozone layer, while also destroying the lungs of anyone who breathes them in. They also cause cancer. “China is the biggest coal-burner in the world,” explains Jens Lubbadeh of Greenpeace. “Some of the dirtiest coalfi red power plants on the planet can be found in China.” The country is host to at least 620 power plants. They’re the engines of China’s booming economy, and every year they emit around nine million tonnes of NOx. The consequences are devastating. Environmental toxins are the biggest killers in China; cancer is now the leading cause of death, killing one in four Chinese people. Recently, the government admitted to the existence of 247 cancer villages.

“CHINA’S ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS WILL HAVE A DEVASTATING IMPACT ON THE ENTIRE WORLD.“

TOXIC FASHION Cheap, chic and toxic: many of the clothes for sale in Australia – such as the jeans seen here – are made in China. A Greenpeace study revealed that some of the fabrics contain carcinogenic dyes, toxic nonylphenol ethoxylates (detergents) and phthalates (softeners). SUBSTITUTE SUNRISE According to US scientists, Beijing only had 13 days of ‘good’ air quality in 2013. There were 70 days of ‘moderate pollution’; 64 days levels ‘unhealthy’ for sensitive groups; 148 days at ‘unhealthy’ levels; 45 days at ‘very unhealthy’ levels; 14 days deemed ‘hazardous’; and one day, 12 January, registered at ‘beyond index’ – in other words, off the scale. POISONOUS LIFELINE The Fuhe river, September 2013: fi sh with a combined weight of 125,000kg died from ammonia poisoning. Experts found 196mg of the toxin in every litre of river water. Breathing can be fatal here: the smog in Harbin, a city in northeast China, was so thick during October 2013 that visibility was down to a few metres. Tests found over 500 micrograms of particulate matter in every cubic metre of air, amounting to a total of 50 tonnes of toxins across the entire metropolis. The main drivers of this “airpocalypse” were the textile, chemical, automobile, aircraft and pharmaceutical industries. Their constant emissions create a huge poisonous cocktail of sulphur dioxide, lead, chrome, arsenic, nitrogen oxide, vanadium, manganese, selenium, cobalt, cadmium and mercury – and this deadly fog is now spreading beyond China’s borders…

HOW DOES CHINA’S POLLUTION REACH YOUR BLOODSTREAM? A change of scenery: the Yellow River meanders through the metropolis of Jinan, a city 400 kilometres south of Beijing with a population of seven million. The river looks like a fastfl owing mudslide. It’s already travelled 4,500 kilometres and passed by 10,000 chemical factories; Jinan now adds textile, steel, paper and cement factories into the toxic mix. Drainpipe after drainpipe spews acid, paint, varnish, adhesive, detergent and waste into the fi lthy water, which then tours the world’s oceans. A single litre of water taken from the Yellow River contains as much as 8.45 micrograms of nitrobenzene; and 240 kilometres downstream from Jinan, a shocking 1.3 kilos of nitrobenzene are spat into the East China Sea every minute. They travel with the currents into the Indian Ocean, and then into the Atlantic Ocean before being picked up by the powerful Gulf Stream. That’s how nitrobenzene and other toxins wind up on the beaches of Spain’s Canary Islands. When swimmers splash around in the waters off Tenerife, the nitrobenzene can be absorbed by their skin, causing serious damage to the blood, as red blood cells become unable to properly absorb oxygen. Acute poisoning – which taking a dip in the Yellow River would result in – can prove fatal for humans within just hours, while repeated exposure to small amounts of nitrobenzene will damage the central nervous system, and can eventually lead to cancer. The potential impact for Australia may not seem that serious, since the oceans act as vast reservoirs, diluting the toxins far and wide, but it’s probably only a matter of time before we see the first cases of poisoning here too.

STINKING STEW The Yellow River near Shizuishan is so contaminated with paint, adhesives, acids, detergents and toxic waste that it gives off a horrifyingly foul stench.

HOW CAN CHINA REVERSE ITS YEARS OF TOXIC DAMAGE? But the question is, could we stop this tsunami of poison, even if we tried? If things continue as they are, the answer is no – as the events of October 2013 proved. When an enormous smog cloud settled over northeast China for several weeks, residents were banned from driving cars and many factories were temporarily shut down or had their production restricted. The result was no change whatsoever. The smog was still dense and choking. For China, environmental pollution is merely another cog in the economic machine: the cleaner a production line, the more expensive it becomes – but Chinese industry is only booming because of its low prices. Introducing countermeasures would break the bank. The only hope is public pressure from within China, which is actually on the rise. The more prosperous an economy becomes, the more the urban middle class grows – and demands. They want cleaner air, purer water, food that isn’t contaminated. In a survey, 57% of Chinese people rated environmental protection as being more important than economic growth. But it’s a massive undertaking. China has more than 500,000 factories, with almost all of them spewing their toxic by-products out into the world. Experts can’t even calculate how much it would cost to restructure them all.

Shanghai Tower offers fantastic views – on some days, anyway. More often than not, however, you can only see as far as the smog clouds. Local authorities sound the smog alarm on at least 100 days of every year. Thanks to the high pollution levels, hospitals are reporting a growing number of patients with pneumonia or lung cancer In order to generate power for its 25 million inhabitants – as well as its enormous textile and technology industries – the city of Shanghai burned 33 million tonnes of coal in 2013. Coal-fi red power plants are the main smog producers here; in some cases, the air is polluted with particulate matter smaller than 2.5 micrometres, at a rate of 602.5 micrograms per cubic meter – that’s more than 24 times the safe limit of 25 micrograms, as set by the World Health Organisation. The Chinese Ministry for Environmental Protection is calling for a fi ve to 22 per cent reduction in particulate matter by 2017 – that would mean Shanghai having to cut its emissions by one-fi fth. Few are convinced that this goal is attainable.