The Threat Of Greenhouse Gases

As the exploration of the industrial development and increased speed of the urban sprawl in Beijing, many severe environmental issues attribute mainly to the anthropocentric activities have been come out of the scene. One of them is the air pollution. Air pollution has been regarded as the most severe environment issue in China since it has already threatened to physical health, especially for the respiratory tract and lung. “In January 2013, Beijing experienced historical heavy air pollution. In this particular month, very few days were observed with blue sky.” (Lijian Han et.al., 2015) According to the analysis of the driving factors, “the population grew fast, and energy consumption and the number of vehicles increased rapidly” (Ju Zhang et.al., 2010), these factors add together can make the air quality worse than any one of them separately can. Firstly, it has been an undoubted truth that more and more people originally lived in rural has been moved to core urban of Beijing since there are more opportunities in there. Therefore, the huge explosion of urban population with more energy release and more CO2 exhalation is seen as an inevitably primary factor causing the bad air quality. What’s more, as the population

Justin Gillis wrote a fascinating article called “Seas Are Rising at Fastest Rate in Last 28 Centuries”. The main idea in this article was to tell the readers that tidal flooding along the American coastal communities is to a great extent a repercussion of greenhouse gases from human activity, and the problem will likely become more unpleasant in the upcoming decades.

Doctors at a hospital in the Jiangsu province blame the girl’s lung cancer on pollution. China’s pollution rates are high due to exhaust from cars, the burning of coal, and factory emissions. Since the economic boom the Chinese now own more than 120 million cars, while the United States only owns sixty two million. These high amounts of pollution from the exhaust has even higher effects on the health of Chinese citizens. Even with these dangerous amounts of car pollution most of the blame rests on the country’s large consumption of coal. China burns almost as much coal as the rest of the world combined, leaving auto emissions accounting for only twenty five percent of the problem. The World Resources Institute discovered that particle matter and Sulfur dioxide, both produced by burning coal, surpass World Health Organization standards in the majority of Chinese cities. In the northern city of Yancheng, a chemical plant turned the villages of Dongjin into a cancer village within a few years. Although China is armed with the world’s best environmental laws and regulations, its government faces huge challenges when it comes to enforcing the laws. There are many reason the laws remain unenforced, money being one, cutting corners on enforcement being another, so the pollution continues to worsen.

China, after an economic boom and great success in rapidly expanding in their markets and manufacturing, has become the perfect opposite case example to the United States in recent times. China began its rise to a modern global economic power in the 1980s, but never once had any strong, well-enforced environmental regulations until 2013. As unregulated factory and automobile use increased, China’s rates of pollution quickly surpassed that of the United States, leaving China much more affected by air pollution than the United States in recent times. In China, there is a much higher rate of cardiovascular disease than in the United States due to the high rates of air pollution. In China in 2012, 98% of people have been exposed to small particles that result from burning coal that are known to cause respiratory conditions like asthma and lung cancer as compared to 16% in the United States (Zhang et al 5323). An estimated 1.2 million people die from exposure to outdoor air pollution in China as compared to 200,000 in the United States. Due to recent improvements on enforcement of environmental protection regulations in China, that number is decreasing. (Jiang et al 2). In 2013, more than half of the days out of the year were considered unhealthy or even worse in Chinese cities. Levels of harmful air particles were as high as 40 times higher than the World Health Organization recommends. By 2017, with the implementation of environmental protection regulations in the area, the

In recent years, air pollution has become a growing problem in China (Zhang, Chao). According to the newly released scientific paper by Dan Levin, “Outdoor air pollution contributes to the deaths of an estimated 1.6 million people in China every year, or about 4,400 people a day” (Levin, Dan). Essentially, air is a major part of our overall health. However, people (including ourselves), especially living in developed countries, suffer from the exposure of air pollution. This potentially puts our health at risk. It causes various negative effects to our body that in worst cases leads to death. Air pollution affects our health in multiple ways; as it varies from minimal to serious problems. The air pollutants have negative effects on our cardiovascular system, causing many fatalities as well as diseases to those specifically in China. People can protect themselves from the suffrage of cardiovascular diseases by being cautious with what they are surrounded by.

China’s energy consumption has spiked 130% from 2000 to 2010, because of this boost China has become the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases. Less than 1% of China’s 500 largest cities meet the WHO’s (World Health Organization) air quality standards. Between 350,000 and 500,000 people die prematurely each year as a result of outdoor air pollution in China. Air pollution isn’t the only dilemma, water in China has been polluted also. Nearly half of all rivers in the country are unsafe for human contact. In the North 300 to 500 million people lack access to piped water, and the piped water may not be safe either. 90% of underground water in cities and 70% of china’s rivers and lakes are now polluted. On top of that there is a water crisis also, that has turned China’s arable land into desert. Life expectancy in the north has decreased by 5.5 years, and children as young as 8 years old are developing lung cancer, and other health complications including respiratory, cardiovascular, and cerebrovascular diseases. Pollution in China not only affects the people it

First thing I want to talk about is just how bad the air in China is. According to Abc.net Linfen, China is the number one most polluted place on earth causing high levels of bronchitis, pneumonia, lung cancer, and lead poisoning in children alone. Which brings me to death rate every year in China, according to the Studies by the world bank, WHO, and the Chinese academy of Environment planning, they found around 350,000 and 500,000 people die prematurely because of the air (telegraph ).

However this comes at the cost of being one of the biggest polluters in our world today but while this does affect us in a big way, it horribly affects the public health the Chinese people greatly. Most notably the atmosphere, In fact according to the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, China is leading the world in Carbon dioxide emissions with over 9 million in metric tons of CO2 being released by china in the air in 2011 compared to the United States which had about a little over 5 million metric tons (UN). With that fact in mind one can only imagine how bad the air quality is in cities due to many manufacturing plants letting out many dangerous chemicals out into the air for the public to end up breathing up. According to an article of The New York Times, a paper done by a research organization named Berkeley Earth reported that about the three out of eight of the air the Chinese population breathes is rated unhealthy with the report also finding that the most deadly air particles cause an array of diseases such as asthma, lung cancer, heart related illnesses while also causing strokes. (Levin)

At the beginning of twenty-first century, the carbon dioxide emission in China continue boosting to higher points, and also currently, China is suffering from one of the worst air pollution in the world. The serious air pollution brings direct and indirect danger threatening the population health. Scholars from different perspectives, such as economic, healthy and ecological all strongly recommend that China need to reduce air pollution. Both a few policies from both federal government and municipal government were implemented, but sadly, the predicational outcome may not as satisfying as them should be.

The concentration of pollution on Earth is rising at alarming rates as the burning of fossil fuels and greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase from human activities. Fossil fuels are burned to heat homes, power cars, provide electricity and in manufacturing. The high dependency on fossil fuels is increasing the rate of climate change “the industrial activities that our modern civilization depends upon have raised atmospheric carbon dioxide levels from 280 parts per million to 400 parts per million in the last 150 years” (NASA). Human interaction and industrial manufacturing has almost doubled the amount of carbon molecules and toxins in the air. Fuel emissions and pollution in the environment are negatively effecting the health of those exposed to it, because the gas emissions contain a large amount of toxic

Nearly two centuries ago, Great Britain watched it’s environment deteriorate from the pollution caused by the rapidly expanding factories of the industrial revolution. Today, China is one of many countries who see it’s growth in industry and modernization of the economy cause similar environmental issues. The country, along with its capital of Beijing, has become the poster boy of the decline of quality of life when pollution is allowed to be emitted unchecked. Health issues related to this have been on the rise, and many individuals in China had devoted time in educating the public on these issues, with the government slowly catching up. The pollution in China is one of many examples of the issues of modern industrialization, but the responses by individuals and the government are starting to have some serious results in recent years.

Air pollution, as one of the concerns that had raised the attention of environmentalists and scientists in the developed countries, now have been targeted at the country, China, that have been going through a rapid development of industrialization. However, unfortunately, the haze pollution in China, measured by the emission of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, particulate matters, and carbon dioxide, has already gone far away beyond being the side effect of the development but also the handicap of the country’s future.

Air pollution in China is a growing environmental hazard that needs immediate attention in order to save the lives of millions of citizens. Air pollution in China is known to cause over one million premature deaths per year (Zhao et. al., 2017). The Chinese have become accustomed to days when a large fog like cloud covers many of the large cities to a point that the sun is no longer visible. The fog like substance is actually polluted air, and it has the ability to turn day into night. The polluted air is not only aesthetically unappealing, it comes with many health hazards that are detrimental. Breathing in toxic air has been repeatedly linked to higher incidence rates of both lung cancer and heart disease (Wu, et. al.,2016). Anyone who breathes in the polluted air is at an increased risk for developing such noncommunicable diseases, but children and the elderly are at a heightened risk due to their often compensated respiratory and immune systems. During an average month, China only meets the World Health Organizations target air quality index for developed countries for six days out of the whole month (Zhao et. al., 2017). The majority of air pollution issues take place in large cities, the majority of which are concentrated on the east coast of the country. Wind conditions can also cause the polluted air to shift to neighboring cities.

Do not know when to begin, people hardly breathe fresh air and seldom see the blue sky. When people go out with friends and family members, they do not have cheerful mood to enjoy the time when they are supposed to be joyous because they have to wear masks all the time. More and more people prefer to tour abroad when they have free time instead of traveling in China due to the fact that they want to avoid haze. The severity of air pollution is more than impacting people’s mood, more and more children and seniors in China fall ill because of respiratory disease, and death rate caused by it is increasing year by year. Government has noticed the danger of air pollution and importance of stopping it. To figure

The accumulation of greenhouse gasses (GHGs) in the atmosphere has been a debate topic among scientists since a long time ago as it contributes to the risen of global surface temperature (Liddle and Lung, 2010). Carbon dioxide (CO2) has been pointed as the main greenhouse gas which responsible for global warming and related changes in climate. It has been increasing significantly over the past century, compared to the pre-industrial era (about 280 parts per million, or ppm). Empirical studies which explicitly examine the link between population and pollution in a systematic quantitative manner are very few in number (Cole and Neumayer, 2004).