ENVIRONMENTAL LEGAL BLOGS

ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO HELP PROMOTE THOSE SOLAR PANELS?

     Some time ago, I posted a report that the manufacturing process to build the supposedly environmentally-friendly Toyota Prius produced a lot of pollution.  In response to that Post, greenies were most angered, pointing out the supposed fallacy in the study that highlighted the pollution.

     Well, here goes another pin to burst the bubble:  China has become a major player in the production of solar panels; however, the production process reportedly produces lethal hazardous waste.  No less than that liberal icon, The Washington Post, reports this in a Sunday, march 9, 2008 story entitled "Solar Energy Firms Leave Waste Behind in China" (the firms are Chinese).  Excerpts:

GAOLONG, China -- The first time Li Gengxuan saw the dump trucks from the nearby factory pull into his village, he couldn't believe what happened. Stopping between the cornfields and the primary school playground, the workers dumped buckets of bubbling white liquid onto the ground. Then they turned around and drove right back through the gates of their compound without a word.

This ritual has been going on almost every day for nine months, Li and other villagers said.

In China, a country buckling with the breakneck pace of its industrial growth, such stories of environmental pollution are not uncommon. But the Luoyang Zhonggui High-Technology Co., here in the central plains of Henan Province near the Yellow River, stands out for one reason: It's a green energy company, producing polysilicon destined for solar energy panels sold around the world. But the byproduct of polysilicon production -- silicon tetrachloride -- is a highly toxic substance that poses environmental hazards.

"The land where you dump or bury it will be infertile. No grass or trees will grow in the place. . . . It is like dynamite -- it is poisonous, it is polluting. Human beings can never touch it," said Ren Bingyan, a professor at the School of Material Sciences at Hebei Industrial University.

     Other examples of trade-offs abound-for example, when under government mandate oil companies laced their gasoline with the additive MTBE to clean the air in California, an unintended consequence was to enhance difficult water pollution problems (because MTBE is very difficult to remediate).  In short, like everything else in life, "going green" produces its own unintended consequences.  "Going green" is an attractive platitude; but platitudes are not very helpful in evaluating real-world consequences of any given "green" technology.

THE PEOPLE'S PARADISE

     From Radio Free Asia:

     Residents of Chenxi county in the southern Chinese province of Hunan say thousands of people are seeking medical attention after a local factory polluted the local water supply, although local officials said only 26 people were taken seriously ill.

“We are not on the main water supply here, so 80 to 90 percent of villagers rely on the same water supply,” a resident of Banqiao village surnamed Chen told RFA’s Cantonese service. “One by one, they are all going to the doctor because they are getting headaches, swelling and weakness in their limbs.”

Chen said that once at the hospital, local people were told by medical staff that they had a suspected case of poisoning through pollution of the water supply. He estimated that around 90 percent of villagers in the area relied on the same water supply.

***

Chemical spills with serious health consequences are common in China.

In 2005, a massive chemical plant spill into northeastern China’s Songhua River resulted in drinking supply cuts affecting millions of residents of Heilongjiang province.

TWO NEW STORIES ON THE CHINESE PEOPLE'S PARADISE

     According a Yahoo! News report published July 3, 90 percent of China's groundwater and 70 percent of its waterways are polluted.

     And, according to a blog called China Daily, "River is polluted by chemical fertilizer,pesticide,herbicides,chemical synthetic detergent(washing powders),industry waste water,human excrement and urine,garbage.waste water excrement and urine flow directly into river without any sanitation practices.the most river in china is unsuitable for drinking.many china people is harmed by drinking water in polluted river."

     Sobering.

THE WORLD'S 10 MOST POLLUTED PLACES

     CBS News today reports that The Blacksmith Institute (whatever that is) lists the following as the world's 10 most polluted sites:

World's Worst
Polluted Places 2006

• Chernobyl, Ukraine 
• Dzerzhinsk, Russia 
• Haina, Dominican Republic 
• Kabwe, Zambia 
• La Oroya, Peru 
• Linfen, China 
• Maiuu Suu, Kyrgyzstan 
• Norilsk, Russia 
• Ranipet, India 
• Rudnaya Pristan/Dalnegorsk, Russia

                    However, per the CBS News report above, The World Bank ranks Linfen City in Shanxi Province, China, as the world's most polluted place.

HONG KONG POLLUTION CRISIS

     Remember when the Communists used to proclaim to the capitalists, "We will bury you"?  As it turns out, the Communists got buried--and now even the few remaining Communist regimes not buried by the West are getting buried by their own pollution.  Thus, the Financial Times reports today:

Hong Kong’s chronic air pollution is hurting business in the territory, a senior government adviser said on Monday in the first official admission that worsening air quality is affecting companies’ investment decisions.

Up to a year ago [pollution] really hadn’t hit our pocketbook,” said Victor Fung, chairman of the government-backed Greater Pearl River Delta Business Council. “But now people are not coming to Hong Kong to take that job because their kid has asthma,” he said at a briefing.

Mr Fung’s comments follow an American Chamber of Commerce survey published this weekend that found 60 per cent of 140 senior executives polled were “very worried” about the effect pollution was having on their health.

Almost 40 per cent said Hong Kong’s worsening air quality made it difficult to recruit overseas staff, while 80 per cent said they either knew someone who had left the territory, or was thinking of doing so, because of the air pollution.

     This latest article follows Posts on this Blog of September 2 '05 and June 6 '06 pointing out the profound failure of China to address and control its pollution problems.  See "Global Warming" category, right-hand side of this Page.