{"id":32526,"date":"2014-11-21T15:46:00","date_gmt":"2014-11-21T15:46:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2020-05-14T18:44:58","modified_gmt":"2020-05-14T18:44:58","slug":"7526-book-review-us-journalists-investigate-smog-in-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dialogue.earth\/en\/pollution\/7526-book-review-us-journalists-investigate-smog-in-china\/","title":{"rendered":"Book review: US journalists investigate smog in China"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The name of China&nbsp;is almost obscured by a grey smudge on the title page of&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/gp\/product\/B00NS3Y94O?btkr=1\"><i>The People&rsquo;s Republic of&nbsp;Chemicals<\/i><\/a>,&nbsp;and this image proves to be apt.&nbsp;&nbsp;This book examines the crisis caused by toxic&nbsp;smogs that periodically choke vast regions of China and the massive&nbsp;particulate&nbsp;clouds that drift far beyond the country&rsquo;s borders.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/cd.live\/uploads\/content_image\/content_image\/459\/the_people_s_republic_of_chemicals.jpg\" width=\"150\" height=\"226\" align=\"left\" alt=\"\" \/>Authors William&nbsp;J. Kelly and Chip Jacobs joined forces once before in order to write their climate&nbsp;classic,&nbsp;<i><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/gp\/product\/B00NS3Y94O?btkr=1\">Smogtown: the Lung Burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles<\/a><\/i>,&nbsp;a&nbsp;remarkable 2008&nbsp;expos&eacute; and memoir about air quality, politics and health in Southern&nbsp;California&rsquo;s smog belt. This time, the duo of self-described &ldquo;smog gumshoes&nbsp;from Los Angeles&rdquo; go farther afield to investigate air pollution that threatens&nbsp;to put a chokehold on the Pacific Rim. What&rsquo;s more, Mandarin editions of both&nbsp;books will be available through the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ccps.gov.cn\/ccps_overview\/\">Central Party School Publishing House<\/a>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>No doubt&nbsp;the translators were challenged to render some of the exaggerated gonzo phrases&nbsp;and slang from this &ldquo;murky yarn of atmospheric pain and karma&rdquo; into prose that&nbsp;doesn&rsquo;t come across as glib or simply baffling.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Ashtray-skied&nbsp;towns&rdquo; abound and burning coal &ldquo;cruds its troposphere like cigar smoke in a&nbsp;closet.&rdquo;&nbsp;&nbsp;Beijing is described as &ldquo;the&nbsp;city where your oxygen sometimes came spiced with black char.&rdquo; A chapter&nbsp;entitled&nbsp;&ldquo;Tweets for the Wheezy&rdquo; notes that&nbsp;&ldquo;a Twitter&nbsp;account had economic superpowers throwing each other the stink eye.&rdquo;&nbsp;It goes on to describe how the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.chinadialogue.net\/article\/4661-Beijing-s-hazardous-blue-sky?order=old&amp;page=2\">US Embassy in Beijing<\/a>&nbsp;inadvertently raised a ruckus in 2009 and 2010 by posting&nbsp;hourly readings of particulate&nbsp;pollution as measured on the roof of their&nbsp;former compound. Intended as a service for American travellers and embassy&nbsp;staff, the air quality statistics appeared on @BeijingAir, an embassy-run&nbsp;twitter page, and showed that the capital&rsquo;s atmosphere frequently was less&nbsp;healthy than the official daily averages posted by China&rsquo;s Environmental&nbsp;Protection Bureau would indicate. Chinese officials took umbrage and tried to&nbsp;block the public&rsquo;s access to these damning numbers.&nbsp;&nbsp;It&rsquo;s obvious that Kelly and Jacobs are&nbsp;relentless researchers,&nbsp;and they don&rsquo;t hide a heavy reliance on secondary&nbsp;sources. They readily confide: &ldquo;We Googled until our fingers tingled. Then we&nbsp;gasped.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Hypercharged&nbsp;patter aside, the writers do know their stuff. Kelly and Jacobs delve behind&nbsp;the headlines and grim statistics of coal emissions and cancer village&nbsp;mortality to focus on the latest struggles to prevent thousands of needless&nbsp;deaths per day from China&rsquo;s&nbsp;poisoned environment. The authors insist that this&nbsp;dismayingly high death toll of 1.2 million premature deaths per year&#8211; caused&nbsp;by cardiovascular disease, respiratory ailments and virulent cancers of the&nbsp;liver, bone, lung, breast and blood&#8211; could have been avoided.&nbsp;They argue that&nbsp;these deaths should be counted as casualties of China&rsquo;s overly rapid economic&nbsp;revival.&nbsp;And the multinational&nbsp;corporations who have outsourced manufacturing jobs on such a vast scale must&nbsp;be considered complicit. After&nbsp;some&nbsp;300 million Chinese&nbsp;people moved out of poverty, the rising middle class now demands&nbsp;a better quality of life.&nbsp;&nbsp;Or at least&nbsp;better air to breathe.&nbsp;&nbsp;Sustainable or&nbsp;renewable alternatives are the way of the future, and China is set to lead much&nbsp;of the research and development.<\/p>\n<p>Solutions won&rsquo;t come easily. Although Beijing recently announced a ban&nbsp;on all coal use in the capital by 2020, China&rsquo;s existing coal plants are due to spew&nbsp;out carbon pollution elsewhere for decades to come. Because government&nbsp;plans for reducing air pollution may not yield&nbsp;the desired effect, they have grave implications for the rest of the world.&nbsp;Relocating coal plants inland&nbsp;coal&nbsp;gasification plants&nbsp;have&nbsp;been green lighted in order to transform abundant Chinese coal into&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.chinadialogue.net\/blog\/6448-China-s-air-pollution-plan-poses-risk-to-water-supply\/en\">cleaner-burning&nbsp;synthetic gas<\/a>&nbsp;or liquid fuels. But syngas has nearly double the carbon footprint&nbsp;of coal and the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.chinadialogue.net\/blog\/6448-China-s-air-pollution-plan-poses-risk-to-water-supply\/en\">process is water-intensive<\/a>. In western China, where many of&nbsp;these megaplants are&nbsp;due to be built, water shortages already are a serious problem.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;A nation&nbsp;breathes its choices,&rdquo; the authors warn, while admitting that&nbsp;&ldquo;when it involves the People&rsquo;s&nbsp;Republic and coal, it&rsquo;s more than complicated. It&rsquo;s ancient.&rdquo;&nbsp;The book examines&nbsp;some of that history. It traces the region&rsquo;s coal dependence back to the weapon&nbsp;mongers who outfitted the army of Emperor Qin Shi Huang with chrome-plated&nbsp;swords and fearsome tools of war while &ldquo;vapours of metals, hydrocarbons,&nbsp;carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides &ndash;the stuff of air pollution today&mdash;shrouded&nbsp;China&rsquo;s cities on still winter&nbsp;days.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Kelly&nbsp;and Jacobs had figured that Southern&nbsp;California&rsquo;s air pollution solutions could be very relevant to present-day&nbsp;China. Like Beijing in 2008, Los Angeles had been highly motivated to clean up&nbsp;its notoriously filthy air&nbsp;for the 1984 Summer Olympics. The technology of understanding&nbsp;air pollution had advanced and some&nbsp;pitfalls might be avoided. The authors advocate&nbsp;the cooperation of scientists to understand the&nbsp;chemistry of pollution, coupled with regulating very&nbsp;powerful and polluting&nbsp;industries, whether local or multinational.<\/p>\n<p>A travel&nbsp;grant from the Society of Environmental Journalists funded Kelly&rsquo;s first-hand&nbsp;research in China, which ranged from Qufu, Anhui and Jiangsu to Shanxi province&nbsp;and included a stay in Beijing. Drolly referred to as &ldquo;Greyjing&rdquo;, the Chinese&nbsp;megalopolis triggers&nbsp;flashbacks to the 1960s Southern California smogscape of&nbsp;the authors&rsquo; childhoods: &ldquo;the dreariness, the silent casualties, the incessant&nbsp;blame mongering, the madness of a sunless existence.&rdquo;&nbsp;&nbsp;A former spokesperson for California&rsquo;s South Coast air quality&nbsp;management&nbsp;district, Kelly is more familiar with the alphabet soup of environmental&nbsp;regulatory agencies than most journalists. He breaks down the acronyms and the&nbsp;anodyne bureaucratese to raise concerns and uncovers the misuse of&nbsp;statistics meant to&nbsp;confuse the public.&nbsp;&nbsp;Chip&nbsp;Jacobs, an investigative reporter with a similar penchant for vivid imagery, highlights&nbsp;quirky personalities and hidden motives in the unfolding saga of climate&nbsp;change. Politics loom large.&nbsp;The book is simultaneously entertaining&nbsp;and alarming, and&nbsp;doesn&rsquo;t spare officials from criticism.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The raccoon eyed, chain-smoking Deng&nbsp;[Xiaoping] never uttered a public word about smog,&rdquo; the authors point out.&nbsp;Instead, the leader urged citizens to &ldquo;Be brave. Walk with faster steps,&rdquo;&nbsp;despite the murky skies overhead. In a &ldquo;Faustian bargain [to industrialise and&nbsp;modernise] contoured by Deng and perpetuated by Jiang and his likeminded&nbsp;successors, China would &ldquo;shape shift into an export-manufacturing colossus&nbsp;dedicated to Western store shelves.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>US President Bill Clinton also emerges as an&nbsp;eco-villain.&nbsp;Although&nbsp;Clinton championed environmentalism in the United States, Kelly and Jacobs note&nbsp;how the bilateral trade deals made during his administration got the American&nbsp;consumers hooked on inexpensive&nbsp;Chinese goods. Prices were kept abnormally low&nbsp;because of China&rsquo;s cheap but dirty energy sources and sweatshop wages paid to labourers.&nbsp;But exporting dirty manufacturing&nbsp;to China could not outsource pollution indefinitely, particularly when&nbsp;antiquated or wasteful&nbsp;methods were used there without modern filters. Regrettably, no&nbsp;provisions prevented China from&nbsp;financing&nbsp;highly contaminating coal-based projects.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;In post-W.T.O. China, something biologically creepy was only a factory&nbsp;pipe away,&rdquo; the authors observe. They conclude that&nbsp;ultimately, the world cannot escape the consequences&nbsp;of carbon gluttony on its climate. Kelly and Jacobs urge President Xi Jinping&nbsp;&ldquo;to make eco-restoration as much his legacy as ridding the party of the endemic&nbsp;graft he so loathes.&rdquo;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>US Journalists follow up their Los Angeles investigation with a report on China&#8217;s toxic smog, highlighting the parallels between the world&rsquo;s two largest polluters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":547,"featured_media":57663,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[760],"tags":[],"hashtags":[],"country":[],"class_list":["post-32526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pollution"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.0 (Yoast SEO v26.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Book review: US journalists investigate 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