(August 30, 2011) In the latest installment of Weibo Watch, China’s netizens debate a Shanghai government plan to relocate 76 chemical factories to undisclosed locations in the next year; an opinion piece looks at why Environmental Protection Departments in China have become ‘Dissolving Departments;’ meanwhile a Yunnan newspaper reports that 5,000 tons of chromium waste has been dumped in several sites.
(August 26, 2011) China’s precarious dam reality has moved out into the open.
(August 24, 2011) One of China’s premier investigative news agencies reveals China’s dams “are like ticking time bombs:” beset by disaster, flaws, poor construction, neglect, and fraud.
(August 23, 2011) Weibo Watch summarizes the week’s environmental news, direct from the hearts and minds, and the keyboards, of China’s netizens as they work for change in the way decisions are made in their communities across China.
(August 18, 2011) “The Yangtze River will run dry” because engineers have gone wild, building so many dams that the amount of water needed to fill all the reservoirs along the Yangtze would exceed the flow of the river. So says “A Mighty River Runs Dry,” a new study by geologist Fan Xiao of the Sichuan Geology and Mineral Bureau in China. Because there isn’t enough water in the Yangtze to fill all the dams to their designed capacity during the impoundment period each year, “an enormous waste of money” will result, with potentially staggering losses to China’s economy, 40 per cent of which comes from agriculture, fishing, industry and shipping along the Yangtze.
(August 16, 2011) Burma’s pro-democracy leader and Nobel Peace laureate, Aung San Suu Kyi, has called for a reassessment of Burma’s massive 6,000 MW Irrawaddy Myitsone dam project.
(August 4, 2011) In its quest to promote green energy and reduce the world’s carbon footprint, the United Nations has so distorted the economics of power production that it is set to subsidize over three dozen coal plants in India with some $5.3 billion in “carbon credits.”
(July 29, 2011) Since the construction of the Gezhouba and Three Gorges dams, Yangtze River’s fish stocks have been declining. The government’s solution – the “Fisherman on Land” program – has forced “boat families,” who once earned a living from the fish bounty of the Yangtze, to move ashore and find work in factories.
(July 23, 2011) Dai Qing was among several writers blocked from attending a discussion on free expression held by the international writers’ group, PEN, in Beijing.
(July 19, 2011) China’s weekly newspaper, the Economic Observer, says the Three Gorges dam is the primary reason for the demise of the Yangtze’s “big four” fish species. By changing the hydrological regime downstream of the dam, the fry population of the black, grass, silver, and bighead carp have plummeted by 97%. Attempts to simulate the original hydrological conditions with forced water releases and restocking the river with broodstock will be futile say experts.
(July 18, 2011) In a remarkably candid piece, the Communist Party mouthpiece, Global Times, quotes critics saying there isn’t enough water in China’s rivers to divert north under the government’s South-North Water Transfer scheme.
(July 15, 2011) Since the days of President Anwar Sadat through January of this year, Egypt has relied heavily on Western sources for assistance as well as for loans and credits.
(July 6, 2011) As is so often the case, regulations engender unitended consequences, hypocrisies, and hurdles that more often than not end up harming the little guy.
(July 4, 2011) Probe International’s Patricia Adams joined a Business News Network (BNN) panel to discuss the dangers of corporations wishing to do business in China given its poor human rights record.
(July 4, 2011) DANJIANGKOU, China — North China is dying. A chronic drought is ravaging farmland. The Gobi Desert is inching south. The Yellow River, the so-called birthplace of Chinese civilization, is so polluted it can no longer supply drinking water.
Patricia Adams
Dai Qing
Fan Xiao
Lawrence Solomon
Mu Lan
Probe International
Lisa Peryman
Probe Media
Other News Sources
Probe International 