The past few months have been busy for the budding environmental organization Green Stone. First, they stopped a plan to cut down 1,000 trees for a new subway line in the city of Nanjing, in Jiangsu Province. Next, they exposed a case of persistent, carcinogenic water pollution in one of Apple’s printed circuit board supply chains in the city of Kunshan (see Apple Report). The day before I arrived for a three day visit last month, one of Nanjing’s largest corporations called the Green Stone office, asking what they could do to improve their pollution record. Meanwhile, the Provincial Environmental Protection Bureau has asked Green Stone to be patient as they work to address the hundreds of pollution information disclosures requested by the group. “I think they are kind of afraid of us,” Green Stone’s Director Li Chunhua laughed.

The key to Green Stone’s recent success is not necessarily experience (their staff of three are all in their mid-twenties) but courage, charisma and recruiting. On a windy Sunday morning, we met staff and a group of 25 water monitoring volunteers by the edge of the Qinhuai River, the main river that bisects Nanjing City.  Most of the volunteers were under thirty years of age, including a few new freshmen from nearby universities. Everyone’s spirits were high as we embarked on one of Green Stone’s bi-monthly “river walks,” to collect water quality samples using donated equipment, and to survey visitors to the river. Most were male retirees, folks who have been coming to the river in their leisure hour for decades. “The river stinks when it’s not flowing,” one of our survey participants observed. “It needs to flow. When it doesn’t move the pollution gets worse.”

The Qinhuai River flows into the much larger Yangtze, the source of Nanjing’s water supply. The Qinhuai used to be much more polluted, at least on the surface. In the past decade, Nanjing has spent hundreds of millions of US dollars to clean up the river. Upstream farms were shut down due to their use of agricultural chemicals, and wastewater infrastructure has been improved. During our river walk we observed garbage patrol boats with long-handled scoops picking up every visible scrap of trash.

But with water pollution, there is often more than what meets the eye. As we conducted our basic water quality tests, a volunteer from Nanjing University held a tiny bottle filled with pink water up to a laminated chart, to “read” the levels of dissolved oxygen in the sample. “It looks like a four,” he said, indicating a significantly depressed level of dissolved oxygen. Since there is little farming left on the Qinhuai, the problem is likely being caused by untreated urban sewage and runoff.

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This summer, Pacific Environment had the joy of hosting Zhou Xiang for a few days in the San Francisco Bay area.  Zhou Xiang, Executive Director of Pacific Environment’s partner group Green Anhui, is an inspiring leader in the new generation of environmentalists in China.

Touring the Berkeley recycling plant

Having grown up in a coal mining region in Anhui Province, he was influenced at an early age by environmental issues in his hometown.  He studied chemical engineering in college, but then made a 180 degree turn.  At his talk at the Asia Foundation on August 22^nd, Zhou Xiang remarked “I studied chemistry in college, and probably would have worked for the chemical industry. But then I met Wen Bo from Pacific Environment and instead, I started Green Anhui.”

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Posted by Shannon Kellman

Our friends on the blogosphere have been pretty busy.

Big news out of Sacramento.  The Governor is trying to find a new way to solve California’s worsening water crisis.

ABC7, our local ABC blog is reporting places where you can still see salmon spawn locally (that is San Francisco).  If you’re interested, check out The Bay Institute for more details.

China Environmental Law is reporting the that World Resources Institute has launched a new China FAQs covering China’s response to climate change.

HuffPo has some awesome polar bear photos.  They’re also talking about Crude, a movie which shows Chevron for the enemy of the environmental movement that they are.  Go see it!

And for the wannabe fashionistas in all of us: Frei Designs has released their Winter 2010 line, full of organic and seriously pretty dresses.

Happy Friday!

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about water pollution in China. The recent explosion at Jilin Petrochina that sent 100 tons of benzene flowing down the Songhua River was horrifying. The pollution traveled through the massive city of Harbin and is now approaching Russia’s Amur River and the city of Khabarovsk. Friends in Khabarovsk say they are just hoping that the river will freeze more quickly than expected, potentially trapping the benzene in ice before it reaches the city. Check out our statement regarding the Harbin crisis here.

The statistics about China’s pollution are staggering: Sixteen of the 20 most polluted cities in the world are in China. More than a quarter of China’s population lacks access to clean drinking water. Seventy percent of China’s rivers and lakes are considered to be polluted. Earlier this year, villagers rioted over water pollution, and such protests are becoming more and more common.

But there are hopeful signs. China’s central government has recognized that environmental degradation is becoming a barrier to economic prosperity. China’s government is becoming more open to civil society organizations, as the government realizes that it cannot solve these challenges itself. Environmental groups in China can play a vital role in helping villagers work with the government and companies to mandate enforceable pollution norms, gain just compensation, and close down the most egregiously polluting factories.

In short, we can’t ignore China’s pollution issues. What we can do is help local community groups in China have more of an impact in preventing the pollution from happening.

Cheers,

David Gordon

(Executive Director)