China says can ensure good air quality during Olympics

[December]

China is doing the right thing. :)

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-03/11/xin_3620305111651640590612.jpg

BEIJING, March 11 (Xinhua) -- China is able to ensure a good air quality during the Olympic Games, fulfilling its commitment made seven years ago for the Olympic bid, an official said on Tuesday.

The environment authorities in Beijing are keeping a close watch over major pollution indices everyday, including sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide and particulate matters, said Zhang Lijun, deputy head of the State Environmental Protection Administration.

"Three indices have met national standards due to years of efforts, and we promise the index of particulate matters will also meet standards during the Olympics," he said at a press conference held on the sidelines of the annual session of parliament.

Beijing has input 120 billion yuan (16.9 billion U.S. dollars) in improving the air quality in the past years, and the number of "blue sky" days, or days with fairly good air quality, increased to 246 last year from 100 in 1998, he said.

Meanwhile, Beijing's neighbouring municipality Tianjin, the provinces of Hebei, Shanxi and Shandong, and the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region are lending a hand to the capital to attain anti-pollution goals, he said. Work in these areas includes closing major polluters, removing outmoded cabs and reconditioning gas stations to capture harmful chemicals.

Speaking of climate change at the press conference, Xie Zhenhua, vice minister in charge of the National Development and Reform Commission, pledged that China will take effective measures to control greenhouse gas emissions while developing economy.

"China is also willing to cooperate with the international communities to tackle climate change," he said.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-03/11/content_7767877.htm


http://imgs.xinhuanet.com/icon/2006english/08oly/emblem.gif

http://www.chinaview.cn/08olympics/index.htm

[Go Fish]

Yeah, they're going to cannons to fired silver iodide into the clouds to make it rain. What a bunch of frigging cavemen! "Let's poison the soil and the water in hopes of being the first nation in history to make the sky behave".

[December]

Yeah, they're going to cannons to fired silver iodide into the clouds to make it rain. What a bunch of frigging cavemen! "Let's poison the soil and the water in hopes of being the first nation in history to make the sky behave".


You sound angry.... Do you hate China or what is the issue here?

http://imgs.xinhuanet.com/icon/2006english/08oly/emblem.gif

http://www.chinaview.cn/08olympics/index.htm

[Go Fish]

China is a sponsor of Middle Eastern terrorism, they wrecked one of our aircraft and held the crew hostage, they are threatening America with the very technology Bill Clinton sold them, and quite frankly, their food sucks.
No, I don't hate China. The world would be a better place without it in its current form, however. Does the place suck? Well, in a word...Yes.
Do you have some information related to cloud seeding which is relevant?

[preservanation]

BEIJING (AP) - China's Health Ministry issued a nationwide alert Saturday calling for heightened efforts to control a virus that has caused the deaths of 22 children in one city and shows signs of spreading.

Health bureaus around the country must step up monitoring for hand, foot and mouth disease following a "relatively large" outbreak in the central city of Fuyang, the Health Ministry said in notices on its Web site.

The ministry warned that cases were more numerous this year than in recent years, and the peak for transmission would likely come in June and July.

The outbreak is another concern for China's communist government as it gears up to welcome hundreds of thousands of foreigners for this summer's Beijing Olympics. It's also an uncomfortable reminder of the SARS pneumonia outbreak in 2003, which Beijing tried to cover up but then adopted drastic measures to control. http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080503/D90E5EQO0.html

Seems like air quality could be the least of their worries.

[Pookie]

Ohhhh, lovely. Let's hope no one becomes ill at the Olympics, but a larger concern would be to pray that no one else ever gets this.
I hope and pray this will stop.
Purrs,
Pookie

[preservanation]

22 children dead in one city and spreading.
My guess is that is probably worse than the China Govt is letting on.
Let's hope they get a handle on this soon...

[preservanation]

http://img.iht.com/images/2008/06/30/30chinaclose550.jpg

Olympic nightmare: A red tide in the Yellow Sea
By Jim Yardley Published: June 30, 2008

BEIJING: With less than six weeks before it plays host to the Olympic sailing regatta, the city of Qingdao has mobilized thousands of people and an armada of small boats to clean up an algae bloom that is choking large stretches of the coastline and threatening to impede the Olympic competition.

Local officials have initiated an all-out effort to clean up the algae by mid-July. Media reports estimate that as many as 20,000 people have either volunteered or been ordered to participate in the operation, while 1,000 boats are scooping algae out of the Yellow Sea. The official news agency, Xinhua, reported that algae currently covered a third of the coastal waters designated for the Olympic races.

Water quality has been a concern for the sailing events, given that many coastal Chinese cities dump untreated sewage into the sea. At the same time, rivers and tributaries emptying into coastal waters are often contaminated with high levels of nitrates from agricultural and industrial runoff. These nitrates contribute to the red tides of algae that often bloom along sections of China's coastline.

But officials in Qingdao said pollution and poor water quality did not have a "substantial link" to the current outbreak, according to Xinhua. Instead, scientists blamed the bloom on increased rainfall and warmer waters in the Yellow Sea. Algae are now blooming over more than 12,900 square kilometers, or 5,000 square miles, of the sea, according to Xinhua.

"We will make all our efforts to finish this job," said a propaganda official in Qingdao. "Now, forces from the entire province have become involved." He said ships and boats had been sent from two other coastal cities, Rizhao and Yantai, to help haul away the algae.

Olympic nightmare: A red tide in the Yellow SeaCoalition says 33 militants killed in Afghanistan Man fatally stabs 5 police officers in ShanghaiYuan Zhiping, an official with the Qingdao Olympic Sailing Committee, said Sunday that the government would attempt to block algae from floating into the Olympic sailing area by installing a fenced perimeter in the sea that is more than 50 kilometers, or 30 miles, long.

"I believe we will make sure the Olympics sailing area is clean by July 15 through our efforts, and make sure the Olympics sailing goes smoothly," Yuan said, according to the Shandong News Web site.

Photographs in the Chinese media showed rickety wooden boats overflowing with green mounds of algae collected from the sea. One photo showed a young boy crouched on a beach beside piles of the leafy glop as a dump truck carried off a large load of algae. State media reported that 100,000 tons of the algae had already been taken out of the water. Much of it was being transported to farms as feed for pigs and other animals, according to news reports.

Residents of Qingdao have been anticipating the city's Olympic moment for several years.

One local newspaper reported that 11,000 college students had volunteered for cleanup duty during the weekend. Several companies organized teams of employees to help.

The massive algae outbreak comes as some sailing teams are already in Qingdao preparing for the Olympics.

Photographs in the Australian press showed an Australian team seemingly stuck in a carpet of algae during a training run. http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/06/30/asia/china.php

[Rage]

Yes. For the olymics the chinese will stop being the number one pollution cause to the enviroment. Yeah sounds very believable.

[Elrathin]

I know many of the U.S. teams have trained hard and long for this event, but my family is boycotting the Olympics. China should have never been given the honor to host the Olympic Games.