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Both government and people at fault for smog
By Wang Aihua |
January 17, 2013, Thursday
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CHINA is banking on a cold snap to blow away lingering dense smog that has shrouded many cities since the weekend.
But the seasonal hazard will probably always be an uninvited guest without the public's conscientious participation in the country's "green storm."
The government can easily be faulted for slack supervision over industrial pollution, but people have to look at their own contributions to the aggregation of PM2.5, a dangerous, previously unmeasured particulate that endangers health.
The haze has prompted Chinese people to ponder: What do we want, breathtaking growth or taking a breath amid choking air?
Years of economic growth, driven by the desire of once-impoverished people to become better off, has led to surging carbon dioxide emissions and increasing discharge of hazardous chemicals by industrial manufacturers.
The voices calling for environmental improvements are loud, but the government is caught in the dilemma between sustaining its people's twin dreams of "living better" and "living green."
Shutting down factories risks increasing unemployment. Levying higher taxes on automobiles and limiting the number of vehicle plates would discourage consumption, a major engine for economic growth.
On the one hand, better-off people aspire for more comfortable lifestyles with bigger houses, automobiles, and air-conditioning, but on the other hand, these high energy-consuming possessions tax the environment.
Central heating or not?
An interesting example is the recent online debate about whether to offer central heating to residents in southern China, which is experiencing unusual cold this winter.
Southern residents certainly have the right to adequate heat, but that means burning more high-polluting coal. Coal is China's major fuel and a major air pollutant.
Society is interlinked. Fighting pollution requires the concerted efforts of all social links and when it comes to individual cases, everyone has a part to play.
As the hazardous smoggy weather continues, people are calling for actions to change the situation.
And the key is partly in their own hands. They have to help strike a balance between "living better" and "living green."
Smog is expected to disperse midweek as strong wind sweeps parts of China, but it might recur next year and the year after next, while factories, cars and furnaces continue to emit these PM2.5 particles.
With such a large population to sustain and large areas of environmentally fragile territory, Chinese people's dream of living like Americans currently seems a bit excessive if they want to help preserve the eco-system.
The author is a Xinhua writer.
But the seasonal hazard will probably always be an uninvited guest without the public's conscientious participation in the country's "green storm."
The government can easily be faulted for slack supervision over industrial pollution, but people have to look at their own contributions to the aggregation of PM2.5, a dangerous, previously unmeasured particulate that endangers health.
The haze has prompted Chinese people to ponder: What do we want, breathtaking growth or taking a breath amid choking air?
Years of economic growth, driven by the desire of once-impoverished people to become better off, has led to surging carbon dioxide emissions and increasing discharge of hazardous chemicals by industrial manufacturers.
The voices calling for environmental improvements are loud, but the government is caught in the dilemma between sustaining its people's twin dreams of "living better" and "living green."
Shutting down factories risks increasing unemployment. Levying higher taxes on automobiles and limiting the number of vehicle plates would discourage consumption, a major engine for economic growth.
On the one hand, better-off people aspire for more comfortable lifestyles with bigger houses, automobiles, and air-conditioning, but on the other hand, these high energy-consuming possessions tax the environment.
Central heating or not?
An interesting example is the recent online debate about whether to offer central heating to residents in southern China, which is experiencing unusual cold this winter.
Southern residents certainly have the right to adequate heat, but that means burning more high-polluting coal. Coal is China's major fuel and a major air pollutant.
Society is interlinked. Fighting pollution requires the concerted efforts of all social links and when it comes to individual cases, everyone has a part to play.
As the hazardous smoggy weather continues, people are calling for actions to change the situation.
And the key is partly in their own hands. They have to help strike a balance between "living better" and "living green."
Smog is expected to disperse midweek as strong wind sweeps parts of China, but it might recur next year and the year after next, while factories, cars and furnaces continue to emit these PM2.5 particles.
With such a large population to sustain and large areas of environmentally fragile territory, Chinese people's dream of living like Americans currently seems a bit excessive if they want to help preserve the eco-system.
The author is a Xinhua writer.
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