China’s Water and Air pollution Crisis
Published on Jan 13, 2014: Lately there’s been a lot of talk about Chinese air pollution; smog so thick, you can barely see the streets of Beijing.
But what you might not know is that China is facing a major water crisis. Rivers are drying up and there’s not enough water to go around. And what little water there is has been so polluted by chemical and industrial run off, it’s undrinkable.
And if the Three Gorges Dam didn’t cause enough trouble, the next great public work sure will. It’s called The South-North Diversion Project, and will link up the Yellow River with the Yangtze River, hopefully funneling water from the south to the water starved North. All it takes is drilling through the Himalayas.
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Shanghai Tower (650 meters) gives a good perspective on the air pollution (smog)
Reuters: Severe pollution in Beijing has made the Chinese capital “barely suitable” for living, according to an official Chinese report, as the world’s second-largest economy tries to reduce often hazardous levels of smog caused by decades of rapid growth.
Pollution is a rising concern for China’s stability-obsessed leaders, keen to douse potential unrest as affluent city dwellers turn against a growth-at-all-costs economic model that has tainted much of the country’s air, water and soil. The report, by the Beijing-based Social Science Academic Press and the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, ranked the Chinese capital second worst out of 40 global cities for its environmental conditions, official media reported on Thursday.
China’s smog has brought some Chinese cities to a near standstill, caused flight delays and forced schools to shut.
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well thank god I waited to drink beer tonight. the water in the south is
in large supply but it is all run off from the north and black. nothing
lives in it. when I was in Hainin china I turned on the shower and it
comes out yellow and smells like piss. oh I was naked and standing in the
shower when I turned it on.
gao is gonna miss me guys, soon I go to china to bring home my spanking
brand new Chinese wife. she is Cantonese so yes a much better
quality person than his kind, so I will be very busy banging my brains out
and not able to play on youtube much. just be happy my video camera not
on. you might go blind.
crap crap and more crap
They say the CCP stays in power because they feed the people. If studying
the Third Reich has taught me anything, people fear uncertainty, and
because the CCP provides security from this, they stay in power. I fear
what the CCP will do with their backs to the wall, especially with regards
to Japan. Vietnam? Money on Vietnam, remember the Sino-Veitamese War of
1980 (I think that’s the year…)
Stop drinking China’s water, the poor elite members of the CCP can’t fill
their many pools in their mansions. I bet collecting rain water isn’t an
option with the air pollution, it becomes undrinkable before it hits the
ground!
The result of greed?
India has sanitation and water problems just like China. India fighting
over water, and some rivers don’t even make it to the ocean anymore.
Western U.S. needs to learn to conserve water, but the farmers need large
amounts for their crops. All people of the world have problem with clean
fresh water, because it brings new wars and conflicts.
Why haven’t you done a video on the massive fire that burnt down a huge
amount of shangri-la that was started in a newly built hotel and when the
firefighters didn’t come and a local man opened a fire hydrant there was no
water because the CCP turned them off!
I’m going to live in Shanghai in September to study at Fudan university for
a semester, this is quite startling, haha
2:47 This is hyperbole and offensive. I’ve been to China. While the water
conditions in Beijing were atrocious (undrinkable tap water at the Nikko
Hotel, open sewage running in drains throughout the city), I took a shower
and came out smelling fine.
way to go
Thanks for reminding me to help my country to build it much better. Thank
you so much.
wonder what crisis China is going to have next? Evil Mutants? *fingers
crossed*
Here is one for you Chris, up here in New York, Michigan and some other
states sit up here on the great lakes, we have products that come into the
states from china on freighter which they dump their water that they used
for ballast which is filled with polluted water and holds all kinds of
animals and material that is not native to the United States.. Like the
zebra muscles and a fish called the Goby The freighters are asked by the
country they are coming from to dump there ballast into our waters and then
when they get to the port of call, they then take in our water from the
great lakes to be used for ballast on their return trip which they bottle
and sell as soon as they get back to the their own country. all this
happens and our government gets on the sportsman with higher licence fees
and more and more regulations on what we can do. Instead of tackling the
real reasons.
How does anybody survive with such unhealthy water? They have already
murdered the Chinese river dolphin to be functionally extinct in less then
40 years. How does it support a nation with over a billion people?….and
now your telling me its going to effect another nation of over a billion
people my spreading the problem????? the dead pig thing put a delicious
taste of bile in my mouth, its such a clusterf@#$ it WILL effect the
enviorment globally at some point if not already. If you know anything
about the world currents and ecosystems etc. everything is in delicate
balance…….WE ARE F@#$ED…… chris is the man!!!
Maybe when Chinese will struggle with fulfilling basic needs like clean
water they will finally wake up and do something about their idiotic
government.
Fuck, I’m going to be possibly staying with relatives for a month. Guess I
can go for a month without brushing my teeth
This story definitely has “legs” – to use the journalistic parlance.
Long term, this may be China’s worst problem of them all.
Depends. Some people love China, others don’t. Personally, I haven’t been
there in 30+ years. Maybe it’s better now. Don’t know. But the last time I
was there it was a shit hole. Beggars and pickpockets everywhere,
government officials harassing you for bribes, unscrupulous drivers taking
you for a ride and overcharging, and of course, endless government
bureaucracy. Has anything changed, then? Let me know.
Some have said that Chris’ videos give a negative view of China. I happen
to enjoy them because he exposes the corruption and hypocrisy that is
rampant in the country. I already HAVE a negative view of China. Maybe
that’s why I’m such a big fan.
As for evidence that dams cause seismic activity, China jailed a prominent
and experienced local seismologist after he went public with his opposition
to a dam being built on a fault line in Szechuan province a few months
after the catastrophic earthquake there. How’s that for proof?
Problem solved! Obama is selling fresh water from the Great Lakes to China.
He’s such a nice guy.
this might sound like a dumb comment but i thought china was distilled the
sea water into drinkable water [or something like that] this is all so
crazy though
why don’t the china people rise up and fight…..or wait, they’re to weak
from no water or air…..
people are 70% water, china has to many people they say, solution, ccp run
soylent green soda! it’s so simple! Chris just likes to exaggerate every
tiny chinese problem!
Why don’t they just build solar and wind powered desalinization plants
along the coast and channel that water to areas in need? I know it sounds a
little far-fetched, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
WATER IN CHINA.
Let’s make it clear, China is not censoring this information from their own
people. In fact,they are doing the best and trying to develop the new
technology to solve the problem. We hope they will succeed,we may learn
something from them for our future. The only thing Chris can do with the
bad spins is to fool you, my dear fellow Americans, but it won’t help us in
any way.
They are dealing with their own problems head on and will succeed some
where down the line. What have our government been doing since Moon shots?
Your so good at doing these vids dude, your both professional and
interesting, never letting things get to dry. Not even this ep xD
They should invent fake water.
sad : (
scary look you did at the beginning!
It is a shame really. If China can afford to – and feels the need to –
invest what is a truly staggering amount of money in the canal project,
then the advances that they could make in de-salination would be amazing.
After that, the solution could probably be franchised with Chinese plants
de-salinating water cheaply for so many other countries. This would be at
least some return for the investment, and it would be in cold hard foreign
currency.
Stuff like this is why I don’t think China is likely to become a hyperpower
under CCP rule.
+Zy Liu ,,, very true, I seen it happen in California.
Worth repeating: http://fotomen.cn/2011/12/polution/2/
All states in US have followed California, it really works.
I clearly remember, me as a little guy, here in North Carolina.
I felt the pain, I was fined $3500 for a small error I made while burning
some garbage.
china is like mexico on steroids, DIIRTY!
wonder how much cloudseeding you need to fill up a lake?
All right, now I know why chinese don’t wash themselves very much, there’s
a reason. Luckly, their smell isn’t strong like ours and this is a bless in
the Shanghai’s subway. Oh shit, I just noticed that two years in China made
me a racist like them! Whatever, chinese people are good guys, except for
all that makes them so stupid and corrupted. The communist party, indeed.
It really smells like an addiction to large projects to keep 1.5 billion
people employed, than anything realistically related to logic. Great video.
What’s funny is that China has access to one of the largest freshwater
sources in the world: The Himalayas. Despite this, the commie government
still managed to make water shortage a major problem because of poor
regulation
I very much agree with the core statement: No matter how big the oppression
is, a government that cannot deliver drinkable water, edible food and
non-poisonous air to breath is facing a serious problem, for these are the
basic needs of every individual. If China fails to adress this challenge,
this will cause the fall of the CCP. Sooner or later.
A very nice treatment of the fallacies of central management of resources.
The incentive structures and logical limitations are commensurate to scale
rather than intention.
Look up “Life Straw” Its a tube that filters the filthiest water instantly.
They cost around ten dollars and are given free to African children to
drink from mud holes.
They are probably made in china and could be made available to the public
there.
But like you said the Chinese government looks for mega solutions that
cause more problems and overlook the simple answers.
I wouldn’t swim in that pool of 1000 people, someone may have pee’d in that
pool or worse made a Baby Ruth…
i guess this is a part of the broader chinese movement towards energy
securing, seems the military build up should help enforce that or make it
easier to quell uproars
Simple, We should bomb China or go to war IF they dont comply with New
Regulations.
as a worst case scenario, mass dehydration, revolution, military rebuff,
tens to hundreds of millions dead.
CCP does not care about his or her people only party. Chinese can die but
not a party CCP wants to rule the China as long as they want and CCP is
also rule everything” Disastrous.”