China Environmental Law

Work demands have me tied up again . Fortunately, there is never a lack of articles on China’s environment, and I will recommend four today:

From China Dialogue comes “The countryside is being forgotten” by Gaoming Jiang, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Botany, vice secretary-general of the UNESCO China-MAB (Man and the Biosphere) Committee, and a member of the UNESCO MAB Urban Group. This post paints a bleak picture of the environmental situation in rural China; a problem acknowledged by the government (see here). Truth be told, however, almost all the ills depicted in the article are self-inflicted by the rural populace. This is not a story of degradation wrought by bottom-feeding industries seeking a safe place to pollute in the countryside. The problems chronicled in the post were by and large caused by the local inhabitants abusing in some fashion the land around them.

The Green Leap Forward writes about the hordes of cash chasing clean tech deals in China.

If China’s Green Leap Forward fails for whatever reason, it won’t be because of the lack of cash. Generally speaking, it has never been better to be a clean tech entrepreneur or project developer. Investment dollars are pouring in globally from hedge funds, private equity and venture capital funds, multinational corporations and development banks. 

There is a fortune to be made in identifying and bringing deserving projects to the attention of those with the cash in China. Anyone want to join me in such a venture?

James Fallows has a bad Beijing air day in “I dunno, maybe I am getting depressed?”

Another summer morning, 9 am [eyes glance down to photograph of typical, sunless, smog shrouded Beijing skyline]. You get only so many summer days in life. The good news is, just 56 days to the Olympics, so very soon now things will be great.

I feel Jim’s pain!

While were talking about Beijing’s air, here’s an piece from Earth News on the topic. If you’ve been paying attention, there isn’t a lot new here except for these comments from Jennifer Turner, who runs the Woodrow Wilson Center’s China Environment Forum in Washington.

Beijing’s air quality should be much worse than it was a decade ago, she said, given the country’s exponential growth in consumption of cars and coal.

“Beijing’s air quality is about the same as it was about 10 years ago,” Turner explained. “But if during that time coal use has doubled, and more than a thousand cars are going on the road every day, there’s something right going on.”

Good point, and one I have to confess that had not occurred to me before. Let’s hear it then for Beijing’s maintenance of the status quo, and realize that it could have been a lot worse!