Pollution and the Beijing Olympics

There has been a lot of coverage in the news lately about the air pollution in Beijing, and its potential impact on the Olympic Games. I noticed particularly an article in The Sun on the 5th August.

It explained how China has attempted to improve the environment. It has banned cars from the city’s streets, closed local factories and planted trees in an effort to improve the air. However, it just doesn’t seem to have worked that well.

I can’t imagine how athletes from endurance events, such as the Marathon are going to manage. According to the article, the marathon may have to be postponed and many athletes are considering competing in protective masks. If an event is postponed, it will be the first time that it is down to air pollution.

However, we have to be careful about the judgements that we make - a lot of the pollution in China comes from Britain. At a landfill site in Xing Tan, the Sun found Tesco carrier bags and discarded British electrical goods. Experts say that sites like this could responsible for much of Beijing’s smog problems. Under EU Law British waste cannot be dumped abroad, but shipments for recycling are permitted. Recycling is an economically lucrative task in China – the article cites Zhang Guofu, who makes more money as a rubbish dealer than his previous job as a rice farmer. Ironically, the problem is exacerbated because a lot of the products that are sent back for recycling originated in China in the first place. 1.9 million tons of paper, 390,000 tons of metal and 78,000 tons of plastic are sent to China from the UK.

It will be interesting to see what environmental changes will be made in London for 2012, as a result of these problems experienced in China.