Computers on the Beach

Here's a new version of wireless computing. Computer monitors with their power cords cut off were found on a beach near Hong Kong. (SCMP 10/1/2006) The picture is from the SCMP.

Essay on the Chicago Climate Exchange and the New England RGGI

I have posted an essay on carbon trading and the problem of enforcing program-wide emission caps on my website. (http://www.vermontlaw.edu/faculty/tyang) It is entitled "The Problem of Maintaining Emissions “Caps” in Carbon Trading Programs Without Federal Government Involvement: A Brief Examination of the Chicago Climate Exchange and the Northeast Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative." My bad for the long title, but I like to have the title be reflective of the content. The essay is based on a presentation I did for a climate change symposium at Fordham law school last spring and looks specifically at the Chicago Climate Exchange and the New England Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Any comments are welcome.

There was a related article in the New York Times Magazine a couple of months ago, "Capital Pollution Solution?," by Jeff Goodell (July 30, 2006). Unfortunately, I can't link to the story since the NY Times website requires payment for access. Overall it was a very good article on the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX). The CCX is essentially a voluntary carbon trading arrangement, which includes large companies like International Paper and BP. However, the article was inaccurate in asserting that the commitments of CCX members are unenforceable. In fact, like other private contractual schemes, failure by a member to comply with their emissions limits could be enforced through the CCX's provision. Of course, whether that has ever happened is quite another matter.

Pollution and the 2008 Beijing Olympics

It's official, now. How will Beijing to achieve environmental quality standards, especially air quality, for the 2008 Olympic Games? At this point, air quality standards are not being met. Based on plans released to Beijing newspapers, major industrial polluters will simply be ordered to stop operating for the duration of the games. Construction activities will also be halted. (SCMP 9/16).

A Peking University professor has denounced one part of those plans, which calls for the rounding up and expulsion of about 4 million migrant workers (also called peasant workers) from the city before the games.

More on that Xinqiang river spill

The two companies (Haoyuan Chemical Company and Taolin Lead-Zinc Ore Chemical Plant) that are thought to be responsible for the arsenide pollution of the Xinqiang river have been reportedly detained. (Xinhua 9/11) According to the Xinhua report,

"The two companies had not passed any environmental assessments and had no pollution treatment facilities. They have been discharging waste water with arsenide content more than 1,000 times higher than the national standard directly into Xinqiang River for a long time, said the official.

Haoyuan Chemical Company discharged nearly 50,000 tons of wastewater every month, and Taolin Lead-Zinc Ore Chemical Plant 280 tons, [a SEPA official] said, without revealing over what time period."

Another Chemical Spill Fouls Water Supply for 80,000

A chemical spill of arsenic trioxide was found in the Xinqiang river on Friday in Yueyang county in Hunan province. (Xinhua 9/10, SCMP 9/11). The water supply for 80,000 people was contaminated by leakage from a waste water pool of a chemical plant 50 km upstream, according to Xinhua. Arsenic levels are 10 times normal. Dongting lake, about 20 km from the polluted river, may be threatened by the spill. The lake is China's second largest and a major water supply for Hunan province.

"Let them Drink Milk"

In a recent spate of lead poisonings that has occurred in Shuiyang township in Gansu province, suspected to be the result of a state-owned smelter in a nearby village, public health experts have told the victims to drink more milk and eat more nutrients to lower the blood lead levels. (SCMP 9/9/06). Of course, the victims are too poor to afford milk. More than 800 people, including 334 children have been found to have abnormal lead levels. 368 of them are deemed to have lead poisoning. The smelter was shut down last month. The central government has been investigating, but has not come up with any remedy for the residents.

There was also an interesting op-ed piece in the New York Times about China's future. (Ross Terrill, China is not just Rising, but also Changing, 9/9/06). No mention of its environmental problems though.

Professor Xu Kezhu of the Center for Legal Assistance to Pollution Victims visits VLS

Prof. Xu Kezhu, the deputy director of the Center for Legal Assistance to Pollution Victims visited Vermont Law School last week. It was delightful to welcome her to our neck of the woods. She gave a presentation about CLAPV and her work at the China University of Political Science and Law. She also met with VLS' environmental law clinic.

She is in the US on a 3-week whirlwind tour to meet with government agencies, NGOs, and universities. She was in DC and New York and now is in San Francisco. She made a special detour to Vermont Law School to see us.

What Happens After . . . Compliance with Environmental Orders

Jim Yardley of the NY Times has a very interesting article on China's environmental regulatory problems in the 9/4 edition, involving a 2004 spill into the Yellow River in Inner Mongolia and environmental orders that were wilfully ignored by local officials. (Rules Ignored, Toxic Sludge Sinks Chinese Village, NY Times 9/4/06). A lawsuit related to a pollution spill resulted in a $300,000 compensation award for the city of Baotou and an order to install water treatment equipment. However, local officials ignored the order and, instead, built large temporary wastewater containment pools next to the river. A storm this past April threatened to release the polluted water into the Yellow River. In order to avoid discovery of their failure to comply with official clean up order and to close the responsible factories, local officials broke the containment walls and released the polluted water into an area where several small villages are located. Those villages are now uninhabitable.

Maybe just as interesting, however, are the circumstances of how Yardley got his story (as he explains in the article). Initially, he got strung along by provincial officials for an interview about the matter. Then, this past July, he went to one of the villages (together with a driver and photographer) to investigate directly, even thought the village had been declared off-limits. At the village, they were pursued by a car without license plates, but they were able to escape. Subsequently, they were stopped by the police, and the driver was interrogated for three hours.

The incident actually reminds me of an encounter with rural Chinese police several years ago. We were in a small minibus that had taken us from a Beijing youth hostel to a section of the Great Wall in Hebei province. We were stopped by local police, as we later realized, probably because the minibus had Beijing license plates. We had to disembark and were asked about why we were there. They also asked us to sign a statement (in Chinese), which we refused. After about an hour, they let us go; in fact, they brought us to the section of the Great Wall that we were supposed to get to. The minibus driver had to go the police station, but he rejoined us several hours later. We suspect that he was probably being shaken down because he was bringing tourists from Beijing (to the neighboring Hebei province).

The entire episode was quite unnerving because of all the things I had previously heard about rural police corruption. On the other hand, we pretended not to speak Chinese (and they realized that we were American Chinese), which helped us to get out of having to sign anything. Our minibus driver seemed to take it all in stride - all in a day's work.

SEPA Investigations Announced & Contaminated Fish

SEPA is investigating the company (Changbaishan Jingxi Chemical Co.) that caused the pollutant spill into the Songhua river tributary last week (see my earlier posting). (Xinhua 9/3). Interestingly enough, there are also simultaneous SEPA investigations looking not only at other private companies but also local governments. These include the "county government of Xin'an in central China's Henan Province has allowed the construction of more than 100 factories with no waste-treatment facilities since 1998. The municipal government in Jinhua in east China's Zhejiang Province, allegedly interfered with the enforcement of environmental laws. The Yili Prefecture in northwestern China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region is held responsible for the discharging of massive quantities of industrial pollutants."

SCMP also noted in an article that fish and shrimp coming into Hong Kong from Guangdong province has been found to contain high levels of methyltestosterone and chloramphenicol, a male hormone and an antibiotic. (SCMP 9/3). Authorities suspect that the contamination is the result of fish farmers using these chemicals in the ponds used to raise the fish and shrimp.

A Little More Fall-Out from Songhua River Spill?

China Daily ran an article last week that the State-owned Asset Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) has been evaluating state-owned enterprises. (China Daily 8/23). Four received grades of D and two received a failing grade of E. The consequences of a poor performance evaluation could be not only cut in bonus and salary but also possible dismissal. China National Petroleum Corp. was among 4 companies that was downgraded because of safety or environmental violations, but it was not clear from the article what the actual grade of CNPC was.

NPC Finds Little Progress on Pollution

Based on a 15 province inspection conducted in May, the NPC's Environment and Resources Protection Committee found that the pollution control efforts continue to lag. (SCMP 8/27) NPC Vice-Chairman Sheng Huaren pointed to fraud by local officials in reporting pollution figures and a failure to make pollution reduction a priority. " "Many firms report a lower figure for chromium waste for fear of being punished," said Sheng Huaren, vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), on Saturday when briefing lawmakers on the report." For example, "A locality earlier reported that they had only 3,000 tons of chromium waste but raised the figure to 100,000 tons after they learned that the government would build reprocessing facilities for them instead of fining them, said Sheng." (Xinhua 8/26) Other issues are underfunded pollution control efforts.

Spill Cuts Of Water Supply to City in Shaanxi Province

A tanker truck spilled 25 tons of caustic soda (sodium hydroxide) into a municipal reservoir for the city of Hancheng in Shaanxi province on Friday. (NY Times/AP 8/27). As a result the water supply for about 100,000 people in the city (total population about 400,000) was cut off for 2 days. After neutralizing with some 10 tons of hydrochloric acid, the water supply was restored on Sunday.

Two Ecological Indicators in China Worsen

Chemical oxygen demand in waste water rose overall by 4.2 percent and sulfur dioxide emissions increased by 5.8 percent, according to SEPA. (Xinhua 8/25)

Songhua Tributary Spill not as Bad as Feared

Now officials say that the slick is not as serious as was feared, probably because of the early intervention. (China Daily 8/25) . It turns out that the Changbaishan Jingxi Chemical Co. in Jilin dumped 10 tons of industrial waste into the Mangniu river. According to China Daily, the facility "has been ordered to stop production and culprits have been punished" . . . whatever that means. Maybe letters of self-criticism?

It's ironic (but not surprising, I suppose) that not even a year after the big benzene spill in Jilin, another company wilfully releases such a significant amount of toxic waste into the river. What happened to the "Environmental Storm" that SEPA has been pursuing? Seems to have been more of a gentle breeze . . .

Chemical Spill into Tributary of Songhua River

Xinhua News Agency ran a story reporting on a chemical spill into the Mangniu river, a tributary to the Songhua river. (Xinhua 8/23) The spill apparently occurred on Monday (8/21), and officials believe that it was due to an illegal discharge by the Changbaishan Jingxi Chemical Co. The tributary passes through the city of Jilin, which was the site of last November's big benzene spill. The major pollution component of the 5 kilometer long pollution slick seems to be Xylidine.

Unlike the benzene spill into the Songhua last year, official response to this spill appeared to be much better. Three dams were built, including 2 containing active charcoal to filter the chemicals. So far, none of the pollutants have been detected in the Songhua river.

Searching Chinese Language News Headlines

I recently heard about a website (http://search.adsotrans.com/) (in beta version) that allows the searching of Chinese language on-line news headlines. In essence, it allows a user to type some search terms in English, which are then translated and searched. The output is a a set of news story items whose titles are re-translated into English. I tried it out and it comes up with some useful items.

However, any user should be aware that it does not replace some fundamental Chinese reading ability since most of the translated titles are close to gibberish. However, there is probably enough there to allow one to determine whether certain key words appear or whether the article might be somewhat relevant.

Unfortunately, the website provides no information about the author's background or contact. So, user beware.

SEPA Head Openly Cites Fraud as Contributing to Pollution in China

In an interview with Xinhua, Zhou Shengxian, the head of SEPA, openly blamed fraud in construction projects as being responsible China's serious pollution problems, including greater than expected pollution increases. (China Daily 8/21 and SCMP 8/21). Basically, projects are being approved by local and provincial governments without having met all necessary environmental requirements. Zhou said that "in some counties only 30 percent of the projects had been checked for pollution control compliance before they received construction licenses." (China Daily 8/21). And half of the firms fail to implement the required pollution control measures. (SCMP 8/21).

This seems remarkably outspoken, even in light of the push to gain greater control over pollution since the Songhua River spill. On the other hand, it also follows the public reprimand by prime minister Wen Jia Bao of provincial officials in Inner Mongolia for allowing the construction of power plants that were contrary to central government policies and that had explicitly been judged illegal on an earlier occasion. (Xinhua 8/17) Of course, what triggered the reprimand was not the illegal construction itself, which had been going on for some time, but rather a construction accident that killed 6 and injured 8 in July. Of course, only the "underlings" get prosecuted. The "upperlings", including provincials governors are asked to write self-criticism letters. These exercises in self-criticism would be really comical if they weren't coupled with "stern" warnings that everyone who disobeys central government edicts would be held accountable. And of course, circumstances that give rise to these consequences are incredibly serious.

One other observation. The provincial government pursued the construction project in order to secure needed energy supplies. Their pursuit of energy security (which is one of China's overall challenges in maintaining its economic growth) is in direct conflict with official policies to protect the environment.

By the way, SEPA is also establishing a brand-new advisory committee, called the State Environment Counsel Committee and the Science and Technology Committee for the State Environmental Protection Administration. (SCMP 8/21 and Xinhua 8/20)They will be staffed with 86 experts from academia and elsewhere.

Here are also links to stories on the same subject in the International Herald Tribune, 8/21 and 8/17.

New SEPA environmental controls

SEPA has been making announcements about additional efforts to strengthen pollution controls. One of them is to make pollution control a criterion in the evaluation of how successful officials are, presumably to be used for promotion purposes. (Xinhua 8/14) Another announcement called for the tightening of environmental standards as part of the 2006-2010 5-year plan. (Xinhua 8/18). These are, of course, announcements about intentions and future actions, which may or may not be borne out by actual government actions.

Yao Ming and Shark fin soup

A few days ago, the press conference of Houston Rocket's basketball player Yao Ming speaking out about shark fin soup. (Xinhua 8/2) He basically joined up with Wildaid and said that he would not eat it anymore because it leading to the unsustainable killing of sharks for their fins.

The New York Times is running an article about this and the potential controversy brewing. (NYT 8/13) Since shark fin soup is considered a delicacy in Chinese cuisine, naturally there are some who disagree. And with any such endorsements, there'll be some controversy. But I am not sure why the NYT thinks it's so unusual. While it is uncommon for folks to speak out publicly and in high profile fashion about controversial issues, most environmental issues are not really that controversial anymore. Environmentalism is just about to become a mainstream cause, with a significant amount of environmental awareness at least among the younger folks, especially university students. I have also seen a number of television advertisements in China about endangered species featuring Jackie Chan, and if I recall correctly, 110 Olympic gold medal hurdler Liu Xiang, speaking out on endangered species trade, including their use in traditional Chinese medicines. Maybe, more people like shark fin soup . . .

Cheating and Academic Dishonesty

Cheating and academic dishonesty have proven to be really difficult issues to deal with in China. A female sophomore student at Shenyang Agricultural Univeristy in Shanghai just won a lawsuit reversing her expulsion for an admitted act of cheating on an English test. (China Daily 8/11) She apparently used her cell phone to get answers from a classmate. What's interesting about this is that the court did find that the cheating occurred but that the punishment was too harsh and not applied in accordance with university procedures.

I have heard of other instances like this before, when students were caught cheating, the university expelled them, and a court then reversed the decision. Of course, in the U.S., expulsion would be an automatic consequences and a court would rarely second-guess such decisions (or these cases would probably not get litigated).

It's ironic in some ways that the courts appear to be more sympathetic to students on such issues than to more serious human rights issues. Or maybe, these cases are won because they are less controversial and don't really raise serious challenges to government power.