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69 Comments
- blest, on 11/30/2007, -0/+14No amount of money will be able to clean up China if the mindset to actually do so is not there. Before the corruption is sorted out, and the major players in the country don't make an enormous effort, attempts to clean up China will be all in vein.
- rupertmorris, on 11/30/2007, -2/+13I think the first issue that needs to be dealt with is rampant corruption... throwing money at the problem will only make it worse.
- Radian, on 11/30/2007, -0/+9Anyone that's ever been there will tell you that urban China is an industrial wasteland. The countryside is beautiful and rugged, but the major cities make Detroit look like a wonderland. In 3 weeks I never saw the sun. Just a grey haze of caustic smoke and pollution. And the smells... don't even get me started... by the end of the trip I decided to keep manufacturing in Taiwan.
- ACityInOhio, on 11/30/2007, -0/+8That depends--how much are they spending on dirtying China?
- ZenFountain, on 11/30/2007, -0/+6The only unfettered access to the pollution I have seen was PBS's Inside China series. Based on that, I'd say not a hope in hell. Take a problem in America like the heavily polluted Chicago River that was cleaned up and multiply it by 10,000...that's what China has to overcome.
- mal1964, on 11/30/2007, -2/+8Sure their are, The money is coming from the revenue created from rubber-band sales.
- JoshChan, on 11/30/2007, -0/+5As long as the generation of irresponsible businessmen still live and run their factories, money isn't going to help much. Those people can't be changed mentally. Even if the government implements new regulations, the legal system in China is simply not sophisticated enough in present day to monitor them efficiently. The only way sadly is to wait for them to die off and have the new, more environmentally conscious, generation run a greener economy.
- Mist0r_Wiggles, on 11/30/2007, -0/+5im pretty sure only about $27million of that money actually goes to clean up china. the rest is all divided up within the officials
- HappyScrappy, on 11/30/2007, -1/+5This isn't about CO2.
And the Chinese don't adhere to Kyoto either, they're exempt. And somehow you failed to notice the news story that Japan not only isn't below 1992 levels now, they're 6% over them.
Kyoto sucks. - jman583, on 11/30/2007, -0/+4Unless your bed was made in China.... duh duh dunnn....
- mal1964, on 11/30/2007, -0/+4You should really be worrying about falling out of your bed and dieing, because that will probably happen before anything China will do to you.
- Farticus, on 11/30/2007, -0/+3Yay! I just hope it gets used effectively and doesn't end up lining the pockets of corrupt officials and their cronies.
- TheNatMan, on 11/30/2007, -0/+3Calling the legal system in China "not sophisticated" is like calling duck gullet "not appetizing".
Understatement of the century there.
I've spent quite a bit of time in China and all I can say is that I have no idea how the place runs as it does. This money is going nowhere but into the pockets of the corrupt Communist officials. - HappyScrappy, on 11/30/2007, -0/+3Not nearly.
And boy will it be interesting when at the Olympics next year they have to explain they're only 1 year into their 3 year plan to un-cesspool the place. Why start the process so late that even you know it can't be done in time for the world stage?
I actually like Shanghai, it's a great town. But I'd be afraid to live there for long, I'd be afraid the toxins would build up in my body and cause problems. - jman583, on 11/30/2007, -1/+4This should work great, I mean the 600 billion we have spent on Iraq has worked so well...
/sarcasm - mal1964, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2Sometimes , and sometimes she gives it to me for free.
- stack3r, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2I just want to know ... how long until china needs to start sending money to other countries so they can clean up the pollution thats leaving their land and infecting other places.
Seriously.. population capping has to happen and not just in china, the whole world, but, you know, logic and sense is not abundant in the brains of the people running the world.
Idiots - inactive, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2Depends.
If China really is sneaking up on him with a sinister gleam in its eye, well, might just be enough to evacuate the bowels. - NameNotInUse, on 11/30/2007, -1/+3this mess isn't the result of the individual Chinese person it is the factories producing the worlds goods, granted teh people work in these factories. But it is just as much (if not more )our fault for purchasing good made on the cheap ( cheap in monetary terms but we end up paying in other ways).
- TopherT, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2Nominal GDP for china estimated for 2006 times 1.35% comes out to about 36 billion. Their purchasing power parity adjusted GDP comes out to four times that. Where is the 26 billion coming from?
- geezas, on 11/30/2007, -2/+4They could afford a lot more for this cause, but it is still way better than most other countries, so hooray for China!
- HappyScrappy, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2Yeah, like Taipei is clean. That place needs periodic cyclones just to flush some of the garbage off the streets.
- Jelfish, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2@TopherT
I think what blest is trying to say is that cleaning up China will require a continuous and long term effort toward ridding itself of its current pollution problem and preventing it from returning. That they put money into it is certainly better than nothing, but without whole-hearted concern, this gesture could merely be a PR move. Who knows how long such efforts will last when the public eye via the Olympics has past.
By the way, it's "it's," not "its." - dsmatrix, on 11/30/2007, -7/+9Front page without a comment, never seen that before
- mal1964, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2You're right, Yeah you're screwed mmmleon China is going to scare the ***** out of you.
- mal1964, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2Sooner or later you have no choice but to do it. In the 70's America had to do it.
- Jelfish, on 11/30/2007, -1/+3That doesn't make any sense whatsoever. "The mess for each person in China"? Pollution is not distributed equally amongst people. For example, LA is 3 times less dense in population than NYC and yet LA is much more polluted. One man owning a certain type of factory can produce a lot more pollution than a village of farmers.
- bball2, on 11/30/2007, -0/+2I agree that China has a lot more major issues that needs to be addressed before effective use of the money can be put into environmental protection. It is none the less a step in the right direction.
- NameNotInUse, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1can any amount of money fix what htey have done to their environment? it isnt so much as to how much money will it take to fix the problems money is not the problem, it isnt known if the probs can even be reversed/halted. Sure it is great to develop technologies to clean up the problems cause from earlier technologies. I doubt china has any genuine concern for the environment other than it will affect their Industry. With the way they treat their own citizens i highly doubt they care about the environment other than reasons for further exploitation.
- EmailAddress, on 11/30/2007, -0/+127 billion dollars?
Is that a lot? Soon a loaf of bread will be 1 billion dollars. - opnotic, on 11/30/2007, -2/+3I hope it's enough.
It's 27 Billion over 3 years.
If only 50 Billion is given to the Pentagon by year end (and not the 200 Billion being asked for) it wouldn't be enough to keep our Military running even for 3 months. We need 200 Billion for that and that is after the 250 Billion +90 Billion + 45 Billion.
So yea, 27 Billion is a lot of money for sure. If we had suddenly won that 27 Billion dollars, Bush wouldn't have been forced to veto the 13 Billion S-chip program giving health care to children. (for example)
Since we borrow 3 Billion dollars a day from foreign countries though (and more then 27 Billion a year from China), it all kind of works out. - runningfox, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1Are you chinese? I can't even more agree with you!
- zanzzz, on 11/30/2007, -2/+3Totally inadequate! I remember watching a documentary on the Discover Channel about China that stated the cost of cleaning up just the existing environmental problems was equal to the entire gross domestic product (I believe that was for one year). A dirty coal burning plant comes online about every week in China. Another unbelievable statement in this show was that if China continued to devour resources at its current ever increasing rate it would need an earth and a half for its needs in 20 years.
Have a good day! - JoshChan, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1What I meant was how the state of the legal system is in China. I didn't mean it in the literal sense. I called it unsophisticated because it still can't reduce the rampant corruptions in the country. There is still few law on many areas or the officials don't enforce them actively (eg privacy). There is no separate branch of judicial system like those in western countries.
China can easily implement environmental laws in the state council. But businessmen can still go on without doing anything because there is no active enforcement or they can simply briber the officials. That's where the problem of their legal system is. - TopherT, on 11/30/2007, -1/+2First of all its vain, second of all, wtf are you even saying? They're spending money on the problem, that indicates some level of concern.
- Jelfish, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1Like with all things, including the cheap and crappy, the markets are demand driven. I'm pretty sure there's a market for anything in the US, for better or worse (case-in-point: late night infomercials). And speaking of that, there exists the practice of exporting pollution and waste to countries with lower environmental standards in order to stay within a favorable light to international environmental organizations -- an interesting and sad result of corrupt government.
- marcee, on 11/30/2007, -1/+2I understand what you are saying, but as the TopherT very rudely says, it seems that the concern is there if they are going to spend that kind of money to do something.
In my opinion, the main problem is that as of today, the risks associated with polluting are very strongly surpassed by the benefits... so people and companies keep doing that. - JoshChan, on 11/30/2007, -1/+2In the future people are no longer divided by races or countries, but intelligence. As long as we are the science loving, secular, reasonable people, we will be on the winning side. In the long run, it doesn't matter how dumb some Americans or Chinese will be. What matters is if by that time we are the capitalists who have the power to domesticate the lower human beings. The concept of countries or races will be irrelevant.
- Jelfish, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1@mal1964: The United States also had the advantage of developing a stronger service economy and outsourcing its manufacturing, where much of the pollution is created.
- mal1964, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1LOL, I do the same thing to my neighbor
- Jelfish, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1yeah, but do you pay your neighbor for it?
- tuh2, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1They need to buy Scrubbers for all of their factories that would help A LOT then they could move onto cleaning the rest of China.
- inactive, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1It was posted on http://www.alternative-energy-news.info/diggs/ 22 hours ago.
I suspect that there is a "digg it blindly" following from this webpage. - JoshChan, on 11/30/2007, -1/+2you are just lame
- mal1964, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1OK, But China is smart enough to understand the fact that if you keep ***** where you eat soon you will have no place to eat. They are at a critical place in time where their is no choice.
- Grumps, on 11/30/2007, -2/+3At least they are trying. Our bloody government is still rejecting kyoto protocols..
- JudgeWinchester, on 12/03/2007, -0/+0Why is it too late?
- brent218, on 11/30/2007, -1/+1i wonder how much they'd give me for cleaning my bathroom?
- babu42, on 11/30/2007, -1/+1Will the US now use 1.35% of its gross domestic product (GDP) for environmental protection? Somehow I doubt it.
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