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[The Lamp]

I don't think you should be scared unless you have preexisting health problems that could be exacerbated by air pollution. 5 weeks is nothing. Where will you be going?

Tianjin, Beijing and Xi'an...the most polluted cities in that video lol.

I had allergies and asthma as a young child but I haven't had lung problems like that in over a decade. Do the masks actually help? I might just bring some and wear them, if so.

 

[braves01]

^^ Don't exercise outside.

 

[AstroNut325]

But... The free market... And capitalism... Regulations strangling industries...

 

[foxtrot3d]

The Chinese government isn't stupid, they know they are polluting their air and choking their citizens (and themselves). But, they see this as their equivalent of the industrial revolution, they aren't going to scale back just when they are beginning to become the leading economic power. They simply see the pollution as the cost of developing their nation, the same costs the Western world traded off so that they could become leading powers. China will crack down on pollution once they've secured a sufficient foothold globally.

 

[OpinionatedCyborg]

Tianjin, Beijing and Xi'an...the most polluted cities in that video lol.

I had allergies and asthma as a young child but I haven't had lung problems like that in over a decade. Do the masks actually help? I might just bring some and wear them, if so.

An N95 or N99 mask will help. You can buy them in a lot of places in China (N95 anyway) -- I've seen them in convenience stores. These masks are used in health care settings too, but they're different from surgical masks, which don't do jack shit when it comes to pollution (people in Japan, Korea, etc. with colds often wear those to protect others from their sneezing and coughing).

I don't think you should stress out too much about this, but maybe in your case a little bit of information would help you feel relieved. Here are a few sites I've followed in the past:

http://smartairfilters.com/en.html#
http://aqicn.org/mask/
http://www.myhealthbeijing.com/children/awesome-trio-of-pollution-mask-tests-the-winners-and-losers/

 

[Madness]

What is rather scary is that India's pollution is even worse than China's

http://news.yahoo.com/air-delhi-worlds-worst-13-other-indian-cities-123001955.html

Yup. 13 of the world's top 20 most polluting cities are now in India, with New Delhi having surpassed Beijing as the worst. And unlike China, India tries to deny it. China even signed a pollution deal with the US to stop greenhouse gas emissions and meet targets for reducing air pollution, while India has done nothing of the sort.

 

[speculawyer]

The Chinese government isn't stupid, they know they are polluting their air and choking their citizens (and themselves). But, they see this as their equivalent of the industrial revolution, they aren't going to scale back just when they are beginning to become the leading economic power. They simply see the pollution as the cost of developing their nation, the same costs the Western world traded off so that they could become leading powers. China will crack down on pollution once they've secured a sufficient foothold globally.

Oh, they already are changing. China has been installing solar PV, wind, and nuclear power in very large quantities. And they've signed a deal with Russia to get natural gas which is much cleaner. They have already decided to cap their coal usage.

But they definitely need to push themselves more because those cities are a disaster.

 

[hydragonwarrior]

Oh, they already are changing. China has been installing solar PV, wind, and nuclear power in very large quantities. And they've signed a deal with Russia to get natural gas which is much cleaner. They have already decided to cap their coal usage.

But they definitely need to push themselves more because those cities are a disaster.

All well and dandy, but I wonder if they're actually foreseeing any of the greater long term costs associated with prolonging polution, such as treatment for illnesses and actually cleaning the water and area.

 

[Qvoth]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6X2uwlQGQM

Here is the FULL video with FULL translation. Great video and documentary

been interested since i heard about this few days ago, thanks~

 

[Big-E]

Huge issue and the only reason why I want out of China. I have a great job with good pay and getting more leadership experience here than I would back home given my age, but air quality is just something that you can't put a price on. I have outfitted my home with air filters and monitor when my family is allowed outside, but I don't think it is good enough.

 

[Piecake]

Huge issue and the only reason why I want out of China. I have a great job with good pay and getting more leadership experience here than I would back home given my age, but air quality is just something that you can't put a price on. I have outfitted my home with air filters and monitor when my family is allowed outside, but I don't think it is good enough.

You could always buy a hazmat suit or one of those sweet looking bubble things

 

[BladeoftheImmortal]

All their reforms haven't done anything because the higher ups are still so corrupt. Can't really reform if everyone takes bribes to let it slide anyway.

 

[jmdajr]

Well, the air in Africa looks good.

 

[dramatis]

I just finished watching the whole documentary.

I think given the kind of drive China had for the economic progress they made today, they can definitely get a handle on their pollution issues relatively quickly—assuming they apply the same drive to it. I think people who live in developed countries sometimes forget that we have a lot of things we take for granted; the kind of smog the people in China must be living with is something I thought would have taken place decades ago, in history books.

It's very nice that Chai Jing concludes the documentary by directly showing the small things she was able to do to reduce pollution by just the smallest amount, and placing a convincing argument for how it can be something bigger.

An excellent documentary. The music guy went a little overboard with some of the tracks though. I think Chinese people like Plants vs Zombies a lot for some strange reason?

 

[AstroNut325]

I just finished watching it from start to finish. Great documentary that really sheds light (no pun intended) on the rampant corruption in the energy sector of China and the related government agencies. I really like her recommendations and I feel her recommendation to transition to gas and oil based energy sources is probably an easier pill to swallow, however detrimental in the long term, than transitioning entirely to renewables.

Watching this documentary helps me realize the important of the EPA, and other regulatory agencies that make blue skys possible in the USA. The fact that conservatives in the US constantly rail against regulations is depressing.

 

[Lemaitre]

Watched this yesterday when I saw it posted.

Great documentary, and it's important for people to know what's going on not just in China, but in India too. The more awareness the better.

Sad that the Chinese government had decided to reign it in.

 

[Scoot McNairy]

I went to Hong Kong recently for a week, and couldn't believe how smoggy it was, and how this wasn't a massive deal.

There were no fucking blue skies in HK. I actually felt sorry for the kids there, not being able to see blue skies. It struck a chord that thats the exact complain in the OP from a kid.

They say LA has a problem with smog but it is not even CLOSE to what is happening in China.

 

[IISANDERII]

Will watch this later.

I read before that smokers in any other country are less likely to develop lung cancer than non-smokers in China. I will try to find the links.

 

[CSX]

I went to Hong Kong recently for a week, and couldn't believe how smoggy it was, and how this wasn't a massive deal.

There were no fucking blue skies in HK. I actually felt sorry for the kids there, not being able to see blue skies. It struck a chord that thats the exact complain in the OP from a kid.

They say LA has a problem with smog but it is not even CLOSE to what is happening in China.

Gonna be visiting HK for two weeks. This along with my history of asthma is gonna be a downer

 

[OpinionatedCyborg]

Will watch this later.

I read before that smokers in any other country are less likely to develop lung cancer than non-smokers in China. I will try to find the links.

That would surprise me given that a day in Beijing is equivalent to smoking 1/6 of a cigarette. He has a couple articles on air pollution and mortality and whether PM 2.5 from air pollution is the same as the PM 2.5 from smoking.

 

[33-Hit-Combo]

I went to Hong Kong recently for a week, and couldn't believe how smoggy it was, and how this wasn't a massive deal.

There were no fucking blue skies in HK. I actually felt sorry for the kids there, not being able to see blue skies. It struck a chord that thats the exact complain in the OP from a kid.

They say LA has a problem with smog but it is not even CLOSE to what is happening in China.

Where in HK did you go?!

 

[Scoot McNairy]

Gonna be visiting HK for two weeks. This along with my history of asthma is gonna be a downer

In most cities in the world, there are high points from which tourists can take photos and see the city as a whole.

Hong Kong has lots of them - loads of skyscraper bars, mountaintop platform etc with great views. The problem is, if you go to any of these in the daytime, your view is obscured past a certain distance due to the smog. It's so weird.



Awesome city though, so I wouldn't feel down. And it's visually amazing past 6pm

 

[Scoot McNairy]

Where in HK did you go?!

Victoria Peak, Dragon's Valley, Skyscraper /restaurants/bars in HK island.

 

[Blargonaut]

I wonder if sometime in the next 50 or so years, air pollution in a major city somewhere on Earth will have become so bad so as to require mandatory hazmat suits for the whole population and airlock retrofitting for the buildings, because of this unstoppable political hubris and base greed. An enterprising person could possibly even become yet another millionaire by pre-empting this madness, by stocking up/mass-producing this equipment now and moving to control the safety gear market in that metropolis, before the shit hits the fan.

Will we see the first super-industrial deathzone 'hive city', as seen in sci-fi, born in our lifetimes?

And is there not precedent? I do remember reading a while ago about some town or some place somewhere where all the residents wore gas masks all day, everyday.

 

[IISANDERII]

Op banned? Uh oh, the Chinese are everywhere and will stop at no lengths to extinguish the truth.

Anyway, watched 45min and had to stop. Fuckin terrifying stuff, couldn't handle any more. Will try to resume later.

 

[Cow Mengde]

Good, this needs to come out.

 

[Ken K in the Fresh!!!]

I was in Nanjing about a month ago. Assumed the haze that enshrouded the city was fog but later realized it was smog :/

 

[OpinionatedCyborg]

http://popupchinese.com/lessons/sinica/under-the-dome

In this episode of Sinica, Kaiser Kuo and David Moser interview Calvin Quek of Greenpeace, who works on pollution problems and has significant experience lobbying the private sector to curtail investments into the worst-offending, environmentally unsustainable technologies. We are also joined by Peggy Liu, chairperson of JUCCCE (Joint US-China Collaboration on Clean Energy), a non-profit organization focused on Chinese government training and other green initiatives. - See more at: http://popupchinese.com/lessons/sinica/under-the-dome#sthash.R8VxzwlH.dpuf