Cleaning up, originally uploaded by deekea.
Showing posts with label Weather. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Weather. Show all posts
Saturday, February 12, 2011
The middle kingdom's dilemma: can China clean up its environmentwithout cleaning up its politics?.
In January 2007, a geologist named Yong Yang set out from his home in China's western Sichuan Province with four researchers, two sport utility vehicles, one set of clothes, and several trunks of equipment for measuring rainfall and water volume; a camping stove, a rice cooker, canned meat, and more than sixty bottles of Sichuan hot sauce; a digital camera, a deck of cards, and several CDs of Tibetan music; and as many canisters of fuel as his team could strap to the roofs of their SUVs. No roads cross the part of China to which Yong was traveling, so he also brought topographical charts and satellite photos of the region. His final destination, deep in China's wild western frontier, was the unmarked place on the Tibetan plateau from which the Yangtze River springs.
For several weeks the two vehicles followed the Yangtze west, as the river turned from running water to ice. The thermometer became useless when the temperature dipped below the lowest reading on its scale. Occasionally they spotted an antelope, and once wolves devoured their fresh yak meat. As they climbed in elevation, tracing the course the Yangtze had cut through the Dangla Mountains many millennia ago, the air grew thinner and the wind fiercer. When the ground rose too steeply into the surrounding peaks for the SUVs to maneuver along the riverbanks, they drove on the frozen river itself, though this approach was not without its perils. About a month into their trip, on the auspicious first day of the Lunar New Year, Yong heard a great crunching sound as his front and then back tires slid through the ice, trapping his vehicle midstream. Fortunately, the vehicle wasn't too far submerged, and the backseat passengers managed to clamber out and signal to the second SUV. With a rope tied to the rear bumper, they dragged the vehicle from the frozen river, with Yong still in the driver's seat, transmission in reverse.
Yong and his companions made it safely out of the river. But since then he's continued to travel, in many senses, on thin ice. A vital question had propelled his journey up the Yangtze: the Chinese government is embarking on the most colossal water diversion project ever attempted, and Yong had taken it upon himself to discover whether it would work.
Water is an unevenly distributed resource in China. Traditionally, the south has been lush while the north has been a land of dry tundra and frozen desert. In 1952, Mao Zedong conjured a solution to this inequity: "Southern water is plentiful, northern water scarce," he said. "Borrowing some water would be good." Ever since, China's leaders have dreamed of diverting water from one of the country's great rivers to the other--from the southern Yangtze River into the northern Yellow River. (To fathom the scale of this undertaking, imagine watering the American Southwest by diverting the Mississippi River into the Colorado.)
In recent years, this eccentric scheme has become increasingly appealing to Chinese authorities, as water shortages in northern cities have become more and more dire. In 2002, China's highest executive body, the State Council, converted Mao's grandiose notion into a plan known as the South-to-North Water Transfer Project. Construction on two sections of the project have already begun, but the most ambitious stage is scheduled to begin by 2010. This phase will divert water from the Yangtze in southwestern China to the north, across mountains that rise to 15,000 feet above sea level. The entire project will cost at least an estimated $60.4 billion, and has aroused intense opposition because it is expected to displace hundreds of thousands of people and devastate fragile ecosystems.
Between January and March, Yong's team traveled more than 16,000 miles in the Yangtze River basin, threading every bend in the western reaches of the river. The previous summer they had driven roughly the same route, so they could compare water levels in different seasons. On both trips they collected data on rainfall, geology, receding glaciers, and other trends that affect the volume of water in the river. Yong had learned from firsthand experience that for about four months each year the upper Yangtze is a ribbon of ice; only an engineering miracle could transport the frozen water north. After he spent the summer and fall compiling data and circulating it among several dozen peer-researchers for feedback, he found more reasons to be skeptical of the ability of the project to live up to the government's vision. The bounteous stream of Beijing's imagination became, in Yong's careful calculations, a trickle.
The fact that Yong is free to conduct such inquiries at all says much about the recent political evolution of China. Fifteen years ago, the government wouldn't have tolerated public questioning of large-scale infrastructure projects. But in recent years, criticism from independent scientists and environmental organizations has prompted the government to postpone two planned western dam projects. In September, officials even acknowledged (after the fact) that unsound planning for the controversial Three Gorges Dam project had created a potential "environmental catastrophe." This isn't a sign that China's Communist Party is throwing the country's political system open to full democratic participation. But China's leaders know that a rapidly deteriorating environment could stall the country's economic miracle and ignite political unrest, and so they're experimenting with limited openness to help avert these hazards. It remains an open question, however, just how much scrutiny the government will tolerate, and how much impact Yong will be permitted to have. His midwinter expedition was only the first stage of his odyssey into uncharted terrain.
On my first visit to Beijing, last spring, I wheezed all the way from the airport to my hotel. The thick smog hid any hint of direct sunlight, and for a week I didn't see my shadow. When I returned in mid-October, the city appeared to be a changed place. I was surprised to see clear blue skies. Skyscrapers were visible from a distance, not shrouded in haze. There were other changes, too--swept sidewalks, a sudden absence of bootleg DVD hawkers, more policemen on the streets.
A week later, the city looked, sounded, and smelled like her familiar self again. The street vendors were back, along with the curbside cobblers and the men waving Bourne Identity 3 DVDs. The skies were gray, the sun obscured, and cigarette butts and orange peels once again speckled the sidewalks.
The temporary makeover had coincided--not accidentally--with the Seventeenth Communist Party Congress, the meeting of party bigwigs that happens once every five years and attracts numerous domestic and international visitors. During the congress, the central government, eager to punctuate its new talk of environmental protection with some proof of its commitment, had directed its might toward cleaning up a targeted area for a discrete period of time, reportedly putting regional factories and Beijing's public vehicles on a compulsory holiday. The results were eerily impressive. (Expect an encore for the 2008 Olympics.) But the greater significance of this fleeting transformation was that it exposed the limits of the party's power. The central government can clamp down abruptly and indomitably, but it can't do so everywhere, all the time.
As I wrote in these pages last summer ("The Green Leap Forward," July/August 2007), China's political leaders have in recent years embraced the environmental cause, not out of sentiment or idealism but as a matter of survival. China's environment is becoming so degraded that it risks choking off the country's booming economy: the West balks at buying mercury-contaminated grain, while water shortages threaten Chinese paper mills and petrochemical plants. Also at risk is the country's political stability: peasant riots over land seizures and polluted rivers are becoming increasingly common (see "Pollution Revolution," page 42). But while the central government has issued stern directives aimed at reducing air and water pollution, it lacks the means to enforce them. That's because, in order to promote economic growth over the last three decades, Beijing has gradually relinquished certain types of authority to provincial governments. The result has been dramatic gains in the country's gross domestic product, with new factories multiplying across the countryside. However, provincial autonomy has also enabled local officials to ignore cumbersome central directives, including regulations on matters ranging from food safety to environmental standards.
Understanding their diminished ability to enforce green statutes locally, China's leaders have turned cautiously to civil society for assistance. Since 1994, Beijing has empowered nongovernmental grou
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
The dark side of sunshine: a unique and relatively new crime wave hasbeen targeting solar panels and their black market profits.(Fore front).
Alternative energy gift guide - Solar, wind, fuel cell, biodiesel and more..., originally uploaded by pt.
Most companies have at least considered adopting alternative energy solutions. More than just having an environmental conscience, many businesses have found it simply profitable to add a few wind turbines on site or install a few solar panels on the roof. It is easy and cost-effective. For those who have opted for solar, however, there is a growing threat to receiving any long-term energy cost savings: theft.
Increasingly, businesses are reporting stolen solar panels. There are no empirical numbers to show the rise, but both law enforcement officials and those in the solar sector have been seeing more and more theft reports over the past two years. California, with its legislative mandates and incentives for alternative energy use, has experienced an increase in incidents, and wineries in Napa Valley have been hit particularly hard.
Vineyard proprietors have high energy demands and local culture and politics pushed many to become early solar adopters. Few wineries have experience as major crime targets, however, so they remain relatively vulnerable. They often have little security at night, and many smaller vineyards might not have anyone on premises after their primary growing season ends. At least 10 wineries in the region have reported panels stolen off their roofs of nearby ground arrays, which became common since spare acreage is easier to come by than vacant roof space for many.
ZD Wines, which has ground-mounted panels located far away from its main operations, was one winery struck by thieves on multiple occasions. "In November, we are not regularly in the vineyard, so we didn't even notice the theft until several weeks after it happened," said ZD Wines president Brett De Leuze in an interview with Wine Spectator. "The first time they took 200 of our 700 panels, and the second time, 44."
Some locals who have been hit suspect that drug traffickers are to blame. Like the grape growers throughout Northern California, the local marijuana growers in the region need a lot of energy to grow their crops. And even if they are not stealing them for personal use, their ties to the underground market draw suspicion.
This is just local speculation, however. Law enforcement officials lack the evidence to widely identify black market purchasers, but many suspect that unscrupulous local solar installers are main recipients as well as those in a growing underground trade in Mexico. The online world is also becoming rife with pilfered panels that often pop up on eBay or Craigslist.
Given the immaturity of the black market for solar panels, experts remain unsure as to the amount thieves are actually making. But with panels that generally retail for around $1,000 a piece, law enforcement officials estimate that bandits are making at least a few hundred dollars per panel. Using those who made off with ZD Wines' 200 panels as an example, it is easy to see why thieves would be enticed by the relative ease of pulling in tens of thousands of dollars for a night or two of work.
By and large, insurance will cover the costs of stolen solar panels. But California's Pleasanton School District, where solar thieves have hit four schools on five different occasions and made off with at least 100 panels in total, has had to pay out $25,000 in deductibles. Not only that, but until the claims are complete and the panels are reinstalled, the district is missing out on the energy savings that likely made local taxpayers supportive of the initiative in the first place. In a state where a new report seems to come out daily about another public budget shortfall, reporting a $25,000 loss on the solar program could not have been easy to swallow.
Security solutions specific to solar panels are available, with even more options forthcoming. Alarms that notify police when panels are detached can be installed. And bolt fastening and locking mechanisms tailored to roof-mounted systems can be added without too much difficultly.
Still, for a technology whose savings are based on long-term use and whose main deterrent to adoption is the fact that the initial investment is cost-prohibitive and complicated, adding additional layers of complexity--and, perhaps more importantly, concern--is likely to be off-putting to any business owners leery of the idea. Ultimately then, it seems as if the best solution to combating solar panel theft might be the exact same solution that critics say is necessary to get more people to adopt the technology in the first place: figure out a way to make them cheaper.
Source Citation
Wade, Jared. "The dark side of sunshine: a unique and relatively new crime wave has been targeting solar panels and their black market profits." Risk Management 56.10 (2009): 13. Academic OneFile. Web. 26 Jan. 2010.
Gale Document Number:A213224520
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