US Embassy Categorizes Beijing Air Quality As 'Crazy Bad' 270
digitaldc writes "Pollution in Beijing was so bad Friday the US embassy, which has been independently monitoring air quality, ran out of conventional adjectives to describe it, at one point saying it was 'crazy bad.' The embassy later deleted the phrase, saying it was an 'incorrect' description and it would revise the language to use when the air quality index goes above 500, its highest point and a level considered hazardous for all people by US standards. The hazardous haze has forced schools to stop outdoor exercises, and health experts asked residents, especially those with respiratory problems, the elderly and children, to stay indoors."
Re:Atlanta (Score:1, Informative)
Assuming that Airnow.gov is using the same standard for AQI, then no.
Their number is only 72 at the moment, which is moderate, but not crazy bad.
But maybe the state department has some different scale in use, and we're comparing Fahrenheit to Celsius.
Re:A Prime Example of Externalized Costs. (Score:5, Informative)
p.s. why is the comment entry window so narrow? More breakage - Slashdot was more usable in 1998 than it is now, but hey I guess this is progress... bah!
thats because its in idle view
change the url from idle.slashdot.org/...
to
ile.slashdot.org/...
and it will be fine?(u cn put anything instead of ile)
You're off by orders of magnitude (Score:4, Informative)
When I visited Beijing during the summer six years ago, the Imperial Vault and the Hall of Prayers at the Temple of Heaven weren't visible from each other. According to this site [kinabaloo.com], they're only about 360 meters apart. Smog limited the visibility at ground level to less than a quarter of a mile, and it has gotten worse since then.
Re:Atlanta (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Yet if the lasse fair economics crowd would say (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Better than "Fucking Bad" I guess (Score:2, Informative)
More like they were mad that they didn't get the happy ending in China that they got from the TSA back in the states.
Re:Yet if the lasse fair economics crowd would say (Score:5, Informative)
You both understand that the Clean Air/Clean Water Act made it possible for common citizens to sue over pollution, right? Citation [epa.gov]
I assume that you also realize, that, before the act, you couldn't, right?
Top 2 emitters of GHG as of 2006 per your source (Score:4, Informative)
Percent of global emissions:
China: 17%
US 16%
You are wrong.
The US has been restricting emissions since then, while China has been building TWO COAL POWER PLANTS PER WEEK since then.
We "snubbed Kyoto" because we knew it wouldn't do any good if countries like China got a complete pass and Russia was baselined at its ultra-polluting communist era. All Kyoto was designed to do was siphon money from the US and EU to other countries.
Re:Yet if the lasse fair economics crowd would say (Score:3, Informative)
> You both understand that the Clean Air/Clean Water Act made it possible for common citizens to sue over pollution, right?
Of course. We are not living under a laissez faire economic system. As the previous poster said, land ownership in our society does not give ownership of the minerals under it or the air above it; the government owns those. Government ownership of property is the socialist system. With the Clean Air act, it has benevolently allowed aggrieved subjects to sue over pollution in government air. If the people owned the air over their land, basic property rights would have already allowed it.
Re:Better than "Fucking Bad" I guess (Score:2, Informative)
"Fucking" is not an adjective. Neither is the word "crazy" when used in this particular context. They are both intensifiers.
Yes, I'm a grammar Nazi, and, yes, this thread has just been Godwinned. :D
Re:When will China have their 60's? (Score:1, Informative)
Basic freedoms have improved, corruption has been far less than I've seen in the US (their former food and drug regulator was found to be taking bribes from pharmaceutical companies, and subsequently executed)
The cognitive dissonance here is frightening. Not only have you managed to jam "basic freedoms" and "executed" into the same sentence as you have, but you've managed to conflate justice being done with the mere appearance of justice.
Re:Better than "Fucking Bad" I guess (Score:3, Informative)
>>Desperately seeking emphatic adjective...
When I went to Beijing, the air really was crazy bad. As in, it drove you crazy to breathe it.
It's not just the air quality, which is like breathing soup and makes you feel sick, but also the open sewer vents all over town. My taxi got stuck in traffic, windows down, next to one of these sewer-gas-venting holes in the ground for half an eternity, and I was literally ready to leap out of the cab and run to my destination to get away from it.
Re:When will China have their 60's? (Score:5, Informative)
Basic freedoms have improved, corruption has been far less than I've seen in the US (their former food and drug regulator was found to be taking bribes from pharmaceutical companies, and subsequently executed), and the choking pollution has only been a recent occurrence because of the rapid growth.
You're insane. Corruption in China is rife. The reason there are pollution problems is because the companies don't adhere to the law and instead bribe their way out. This goes to safety issues too. Yes, there are laws to prevent unsafe conditions like buildings flopping over or towering infernos but they cannot be enforced either. And it goes all the way to the bottom, to worker safety, even work hours. Look at the problems in factories. There are laws to prevent sweatshop conditions, but they aren't enforced because the factory owners can work outside the law if they have the right connections.
China wants to clean up the problems but as long as the government cannot enforce the laws because of corruption at lower levels, the problems will still be around.
See China Blue.
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/chinablue/ [pbs.org]
The working conditions are tragic and even illegal. But since the owner of the factory is an ex-police chief, there is no action taken against him.
I have no idea how you can say there is less corruption in China than in the US. Just ask Lee Kuan Yew (creator of modern Singapore), he says that the American system cannot be used the same in developing Asian countries because the conditions are different and corruption becomes a problem.
Re:let's not get too righteous (Score:3, Informative)
...alerts for nearly exactly the same thing went on for 2-3 weeks in Boston.
It's not nearly the same thing. You're probably thinking of the impact of Quebec forest fires in May, which drove the Air Quality Index (AQI) to the Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups range (which is 101-150) in parts of the Boston area. This is nowhere near 500+. (The ranges above 150 are Unhealthy (151-200), Very Unhealthy (201-300), and Hazardous (301-500+).
Re:Yet if the lasse fair economics crowd would say (Score:2, Informative)
It's not going to be easy to get a girlfriend if you keep screwing ponies.