Gan
06-26-2007, 01:27 PM
China last week became the world's biggest air polluter, according to a Dutch government-funded environmental watchdog. The People's Republic now out-belches the United States as the world's largest producer of greenhouse gases - two years ahead of predictions.
Worse yet, thanks to prevailing wind patterns, a lot of China's pollution ends up here: As much as 40 percent of the air pollution our own West Coast states breathe originates in China.
The air's so bad in Beijing, it's rumored that some teams are making plans to do last minute training tune-ups for the 2008 Olympics in Asia, but outside China, so they can acclimate to Beijing's time zone while avoiding the smog as long as possible.
Overall, China has 16 of the world's 20 most air-polluted cities. In some, the air carries twice the pollutants considered safe by the U.N.'s World Health Organization, causing as many as 400,000 premature deaths a year due to respiratory disease.
The World Bank has called north-central China's coal town Linfen the world's most polluted city. Coal dust hangs so heavy in the air there that cars need to use their headlights during the day.
In Beijing, the unofficial air quality index is known as the "building index." That is, how many buildings you can see down the street before the landscape turns to a pea soup-like gray fog.
Coal is the main source of those pollution "exports''; China is the world's largest producer and consumer, relying on the fuel for 70 percent of its energy/industrial needs. And coal-fired plants emit carbon dioxide (CO2), sulfur dioxide, nitrous oxide, mercury and dust. China already produces 25 percent of world mercury emissions and 12 percent of CO2.
And the pollution problem is on track to get worse.
more...
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2007/06/china_becomes_worlds_biggest_a.html
_________________________________________
WAY TO GO CHINA!!!
:clap:
Worse yet, thanks to prevailing wind patterns, a lot of China's pollution ends up here: As much as 40 percent of the air pollution our own West Coast states breathe originates in China.
The air's so bad in Beijing, it's rumored that some teams are making plans to do last minute training tune-ups for the 2008 Olympics in Asia, but outside China, so they can acclimate to Beijing's time zone while avoiding the smog as long as possible.
Overall, China has 16 of the world's 20 most air-polluted cities. In some, the air carries twice the pollutants considered safe by the U.N.'s World Health Organization, causing as many as 400,000 premature deaths a year due to respiratory disease.
The World Bank has called north-central China's coal town Linfen the world's most polluted city. Coal dust hangs so heavy in the air there that cars need to use their headlights during the day.
In Beijing, the unofficial air quality index is known as the "building index." That is, how many buildings you can see down the street before the landscape turns to a pea soup-like gray fog.
Coal is the main source of those pollution "exports''; China is the world's largest producer and consumer, relying on the fuel for 70 percent of its energy/industrial needs. And coal-fired plants emit carbon dioxide (CO2), sulfur dioxide, nitrous oxide, mercury and dust. China already produces 25 percent of world mercury emissions and 12 percent of CO2.
And the pollution problem is on track to get worse.
more...
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2007/06/china_becomes_worlds_biggest_a.html
_________________________________________
WAY TO GO CHINA!!!
:clap: