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December 23rd, 2016:

China’s Smog Is as Deadly as Smoking, New Research Claims

Current severe smog in northern China is affecting nearly half a billion people

http://time.com/4617295/china-smog-smoking-environment-air-pollution/

Air pollution could be the cause of 1 in 3 deaths in China, new academic research suggests, making everyday life about as deadly as smoking cigarettes in some parts of the country.

According to the South China Morning Post, a recent study of 74 cities analyzed some 3.03 million deaths recorded in 2013, and found that 31.8% of them could be linked to smog.

The study, carried out by researchers at China’s Nanjing University, found that the air was most toxic in the cities of Baoding, Shijiazhuang and Handan, each reporting more than 30,000 deaths in 2013 that could be linked to pollution.

It does not appear that the situation has markedly improved in the years since. Last Friday, Beijing issued a “red alert” warning because of a blanket of thick smog shrouding the capital city and a large swath of northern China, affecting nearly half a billion people. With pollution levels reaching about 500 PM2.5 particles per cubic meter — the WHO ranks safe levels as under 25 — the so-called airpocalypse, has sent tens of thousands fleeing to southern parts of the country, where the air is cleaner.

Hospitals have been crowded with patients suffering respiratory problems, whole highways have been shut down, and hundreds of flights grounded. Classes were also cancelled — although in one case exams were not. Shocking images spread across the Internet showing schoolchildren seated outside wearing jackets and face masks, huddled over desks to take a test in gray, toxic gloom.

The Post reports that the new findings from Nanjing support previous research; the paper says that the International Energy Agency published a report in June claiming that air pollution has trimmed some 25% off life expectancy in China, while a study co-authored by researchers at three renowned universities determined that people in China’s north could lose an average of 5.5 years of life due to smog.

China’s National Energy Administration reportedly said Wednesday that it will enact measures such as limiting high-pollution fuel emissions and launching a satellite carbon-dioxide monitor to mitigate the problem, but many in the country’s vast ultra-industrial cities remain skeptical.

Greenpeace has warned that the economy must urgently be made less dependent on polluting forms of energy and that people living in cold northern climates should be given alternatives to coal, which causes much of the smog.

Shanghai water supply hit by 100-tonne wave of garbage

Ships are suspected of dumping waste upstream on China’s Yangtze river before it floats into a key city reservoir

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/23/shanghai-water-supply-hit-by-100-tonne-wave-of-garbage

Medical waste, broken bottles and household trash are some of the items found in more than 100 tonnes of garbage salvaged near a drinking water reservoir in Shanghai.

The suspected culprits are two ships that have been dumping waste upstream in the Yangtze river. It has then flowed downstream to the reservoir on Shanghai’s Chongming island which is also home to 700,000 people.

The reservoir at the mouth of the river is one of the four main sources of drinking water for the country’s largest city, according to local media.

China has struggled with air, soil and water pollution for years during its economic boom, with officials often protecting industry and silencing citizens that complain. China’s cities are often blanketed in toxic smog, while earlier this year more than 80% of water wells used by farms, factories and rural households was found to be unsafe for drinking because of pollution.

Officials dispatched more than 40 workers to clean up the mess, but the area around the reservoir will take about two weeks to clear, the Shanghai Daily reported. Shanghai’s water authority claims supplies are still safe to drink, but has stopped the flow coming in while it continues testing, the paper said.

Videos circulating on social media showed beaches and wetlands covered in a rainbow of plastic bags.

“There’s enough trash to cover several football fields,” a local resident can be heard saying in one video. Catheter bags and used IV sacks are pulled from the water, and in some places only a sea of trash can be seen, completely obscuring the river water.

“This is so sad, just humanity digging its own grave,” one commenter on Twitter-like Sina Weibo said.

Needles and medical tubes were found in the trash, which has been washing ashore since 5 November. Despite cleanup efforts, a new wave of garbage inundated the island again this week.

Earlier this year more than 500 students developed nosebleeds, rashes and illnesses, some as severe as leukaemia, in what local media linked to illegal toxic dumping by chemical factories.

Although parents complained for months, local officials ignored their claims and disputed any connection despite levels of chlorobenzene, a highly toxic solvent that causes damage to the liver, kidney and nervous system, nearly 100,000 times above the safe limit.

The country’s air pollution has been shown to contribute to more than 1 million deaths a year, linked to about a third of deaths in China’s major cities.

Average Hongkonger sent 1.39kg per day of solid waste to landfills, up 3pc on last year

Authorities attribute surge to more commercial and industrial waste being dumped in wake of ‘relatively buoyant local economy’

The average Hongkonger sent 1.39kg of municipal solid waste into landfills per day last year, marking a 3 per cent rise from the year before and the highest level in 10 years, though notable reductions in food and special waste were recorded, new official data revealed.

The Environmental Protection Department attributed the increase to more commercial and industrial waste being dumped, which in turn was partly attributable to a “relatively buoyant local economy” last year.

The average volume of municipal solid waste sent to the tips in 2014 was 1.35kg per capita per day.

Recycling rates for municipal solid waste also fell – from 37 per cent in 2014 to 35 per cent last year – driven by significant declines in recovery rates for waste paper and plastics, which fell by 52,000 and 5,000 tonnes respectively.

Every day last year, the city disposed of some 2,257 tonnes of waste paper and 2,183 tonnes of waste plastic in landfills – 17.5 and 8.3 per cent more than the previous year.

The two categories each account for about one fifth of the municipal solid waste mix.

Meanwhile, the volume of plastic PET bottles (made of polyethylene terephthalate) disposed of alone grew 3 per cent last year as recycling rates nearly slumped in half from 14 per cent to just 7.6 per cent.

The low waste recovery rates were blamed on a dismal international market for recyclables in the past few years, resulting in a “dampening effect” on demand as well as on the prices of local recyclables.

However, the amount of landfilled food waste – comprising one third of municipal waste – saw a surprise retreat of 7.1 per cent last year to 3,382 tonnes, or about 0.46kg per person daily. The change was largely driven by households’ kitchen waste.

The department claimed the drop could “well be a result of efforts made by many sectors of the community” in response to various government initiatives intended to “nurture a culture of reducing food waste at source and to donate surplus food to the needy”.

Environmental group The Green Earth said the sustained high disposal rates stemmed from a variety of factors: a lack of volume-based waste charging, the delayed commissioning of an organic waste treatment facility for food waste, and a downturn in the recycling trade.

It urged the government to speed up legislation for municipal solid waste-charging to curb the growth of industrial and commercial waste. It also advocated implementing more producer responsibility laws and regulations for items such as plastic bottles and beverage containers.

A department spokesman said it would continue to “vigorously implement policies on waste avoidance and reduction, including municipal solid waste charging and producer responsibility schemes”.

It is understood the Environment Bureau hopes to prepare corresponding legislative proposals within the current legislative term.

Of the 5.5 million tonnes of solid waste discarded last year, two-thirds, or 3.7 million tonnes, was municipal solid waste: that is, rubbish generated domestically from homes, and commercial or industrial activities. Most of it comprised food, paper and plastics.

The remaining 1.8 million tonnes primarily consisted of waste from the construction sector, or special waste, which includes livestock, radioactive, grease trap waste and sewage sludge.

The amount of special waste discarded in landfills fell by 34.5 per cent last year due to the commissioning of a new treatment facility in Tuen Mun, which incinerates sewage sludge into residue and ash.
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Source URL: http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/2056687/average-hongkonger-sent-139kg-solid-waste

World’s Worst Air Has Mongolians Seeing Red, Planning Action

If you think air pollution in China has been bad, just look at Mongolia.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-22/world-s-worst-air-has-mongolians-seeing-red-planning-protest

Levels of particulate matter in the air have risen to almost 80 times the recommended safety level set by the World Health Organization — and five times worse than Beijing during the past week’s bout with the worst smog of the year.

Mongolian power plants working overtime during the frigid winter belch plumes of soot into the atmosphere, while acrid smoke from coal fires shrouds the shantytowns of the capital, Ulaanbaatar, in a brown fog. Angry residents planned a protest, organized on social media, on Dec. 26.

The level of PM2.5, or fine particulate matter, in the air as measured hourly peaked at 1,985 micrograms a cubic meter on Dec. 16 in the capital’s Bayankhoshuu district, according to data posted by government website agaar.mn. The daily average settled at 1,071 micrograms that day.

The World Health Organization recommends PM2.5 exposure of no more than 25 micrograms over 24 hours.

800x-1

In Beijing, the year’s worst bout of noxious smog prompted officials to issue the year’s first red alert and order 1,200 factories to close or cut output. Earlier this week, PM2.5 levels exceeded 400 in the capital, and Chinese officials on Tuesday canceled 351 flight departures because of limited visibility. The highest daily average in the past week, on Wednesday, registered 378. Worse, the PM2.5 reading in Shijiazhuang, capital of Hebei, exceeded 1,000 micrograms per cubic meter earlier this week, according to the China National Environment Monitoring Center.

Mongolia’s contracting economic growth and a widening budget gap have left authorities few resources to fight the dangerous smog.

Tariff Eliminated

After first cutting the nighttime electricity tariff by 50 percent to encourage residents to heat their homes with electric heaters instead of raw coal or other flammable material that is often toxic, Prime Minister Erdenebat Jargaltulga announced Friday that the tariff would eliminated entirely as of Jan. 1. Longer term, he proposed building apartments to replace makeshift housing using a loan from China, doing more to encourage electric heating, and reducing poverty to slow migration to the capital, according to a government statement.

The conversion of ger districts, where hundreds of thousands of people live in makeshift homes including tents, into apartment complexes has so far been stymied by an economic crisis that has pushed the government to seek economic lifelines from partners including the International Monetary Fund and China.

On Wednesday, Defense Minister Bat-Erdene Badmaanyambuu announced that a 50-bed wing of Ulaanbaatar’s military hospital will open up for children with pneumonia, as city hospitals were filled to capacity, according to a statement on the government’s website.

Public Anger

Public anger over the government’s handling of pollution has been growing on social media, where residents share pictures of the smog, encourage methods of protection and call on the government to do more to protect citizens. The latest trend Friday had Mongolians changing their profile pictures on Facebook to show themselves wearing air pollution masks.

The air pollution protest next week was being organized for Sukhbaatar Square, the capital’s central plaza. A crowdfunding campaign to purchase 100 air purifiers for hospitals and schools raised more than $1,400 in five days.

“The hospital I visited today did not have any air purifiers, even though 40 mothers were scattered along a narrow corridor, each with a sick baby in their arms,” Onon Bayasgalan, an environmentalist who organized the crowdfunding campaign, said Thursday. “They sleep on fold out cots in the corridors, as the hospital rooms are full of pneumonia cases.’’

Impending Crisis

Earlier this month, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned of an impending crisis if the smoke levels are not reduced, calling children under 5 and those still in the womb the most vulnerable.

“Children are projected to suffer from unprecedented levels of chronic respiratory disease later in life,” the UNICEF report said, warning of the rising economic costs of these diseases unless “major new measures” are urgently enacted. “The alarming levels of air pollution in Ulaanbaatar during the long winter cannot be neglected any longer, as their short- and long-term negative health impact has been demonstrated, especially for children.’’

A 2013 study by Canada’s Simon Fraser University concluded that 10 percent of deaths in Ulaanbaatar were related to complications from air pollution.

“Most of my colleagues’ children are hospitalized or at home struggling with respiratory problems,’’ Lhagva Erdene, news director at Mongol TV station, said in an e-mail. “We feel helpless and frustrated for the inaction of our government.’’

Neither the ministers for foreign affairs nor the environment replied to requests for comment.

Byambasaikhan Bayanjargal, who heads the Business Council of Mongolia in the capital, said he and his family try to stay indoors as much as possible and spend weekends outside the city.

“There have been shifting policies, and that is frustrating,” he said. “There needs to be consistent policy and stability so businesses can find solutions to this problem.’’

Friday’s PM2.5 levels in northern Ulaanbaatar peaked at 932 at noon, while the monthly average for December so far was 518. Meanwhile in Beijing, where the government lifted its pollution warning Thursday, skies were clear and air quality improved.