3 ms·

>China's cavalier attitude towards smog and environmental pollution is destroying the planet. The entire planet? That seems a bit much. I suspect every indus

by gozur88 10y ago

>China's cavalier attitude towards smog and environmental pollution is destroying the planet. The entire planet? That seems a bit much. I suspect every industrializing country goes through a heavy pollution stage. "By the 1940’s, Pittsburgh was dark at all hours of the day.": http://popularpittsburgh.com/darkhistory/ http://popularpittsburgh.com/darkhistory/ The Lake Erie area was so polluted by the 1960s the Cuyahoga River actually caught fire. The lake itself was pretty much devoid of life near land: http://clevelandhistorical.org/items/show/58 http://clevelandhistorical.org/items/show/58 Plus the killer fogs in London. And don't forget Lake Karachay, which the Russians used as a nuclear wasted dump. "Starting in the 1960s, the lake began to dry out; its area dropped from 0.5 km2 in 1951[1] to 0.15 km2 by the end of 1993.[6] In 1968, following a drought in the region, the wind carried 185 PBq (5 MCi) of radioactive dust away from the dried area of the lake, irradiating half a million people.[3]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Karachay https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Karachay Hungry people can't afford to worry too much about pollution, and even after the political will exists to clean up the air and water it still takes time to actually do it.

thaumasiotes 10y ago
> The Lake Erie area was so polluted by the 1960s the Cuyahoga River actually caught fire. Seems like a good time to bring up http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016/07/18/separating-fact-from-fiction-about-the-cuyahoga-river-fires/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016... (Quoted below nearly in full) > As journalists descend on Cleveland to cover the Republican convention, it is inevitable that news stories mention the infamous 1969 fire on the Cuyahoga River. The story of this fire is largely a fable, however, as I have documented at length. Much of what people write and read about the fire, and its historical context, just is not so. > The June 22, 1969, fire was not much of a fire at all. More importantly, it was not the first river fire, on the Cuyahoga or elsewhere. River fires were quite common in the late 19th and early-to-mid 20th centuries. There were several fires on the Cuyahoga over this period, as there were fires in Columbus, Detroit, Philadelphia and lots of other places. Yet prior to the 1960s, and the awakening of the modern environmental movement, river fires did not attract much attention outside of local communities. Fortunately, local communities saw river fires as a problem, and took action. > What was different about 1969 was not that a river had gotten so dirty that it caught fire but that industrial rivers had been cleaned sufficiently that river fires were no longer common.

by gozur88 10y ago

thaumasiotes 10y ago

> The Lake Erie area was so polluted by the 1960s the Cuyahoga River actually caught fire. Seems like a good time to bring up http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016/07/18/separating-fact-from-fiction-about-the-cuyahoga-river-fires/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016... (Quoted below nearly in full) > As journalists descend on Cleveland to cover the Republican convention, it is inevitable that news stories mention the infamous 1969 fire on the Cuyahoga River. The story of this fire is largely a fable, however, as I have documented at length. Much of what people write and read about the fire, and its historical context, just is not so. > The June 22, 1969, fire was not much of a fire at all. More importantly, it was not the first river fire, on the Cuyahoga or elsewhere. River fires were quite common in the late 19th and early-to-mid 20th centuries. There were several fires on the Cuyahoga over this period, as there were fires in Columbus, Detroit, Philadelphia and lots of other places. Yet prior to the 1960s, and the awakening of the modern environmental movement, river fires did not attract much attention outside of local communities. Fortunately, local communities saw river fires as a problem, and took action. > What was different about 1969 was not that a river had gotten so dirty that it caught fire but that industrial rivers had been cleaned sufficiently that river fires were no longer common.