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The River Runs Black

China Takes on Pollution -- Sort of

Environmentally disastrous chemical accidents in China have become commonplace in recent weeks. Now, the government is taking steps to address the problem. But nothing is likely to change.

China has been no stranger to environmental disaster lately. It seems like every week, a new spill or chemical factory explosion hits the headlines. Now, though, the country is taking the first steps to address the problem.

Under a new national emergency plan approved last week by Beijing, China's provinces will now be required to inform national officials in Beijing no later than four hours after a major disaster has occurred. A Beijing-based central emergency task force will be charged with coordinating relief measures in the future.

The plan also seeks to rein in corrupt factory managers and officials who try to conceal embarrassing environmental incidents by doling out  severe punishments. And Beijing has pledged to do a better job of informing its citizens of accidents and educating them about a uniform alarm system.

In mid-November, in the northeastern city of Jilin, an explosion at a chemical factory unleashed a blanket of benzene into the Songhua River, forcing the government to shut off the water supply to over 3.8 million people living in the city of Harbin. Swept downstream, the poisonous slick travelled as far as the eastern-most part of Russia. A later accident at a smelter near the cities of Guangzhou and Foshan sent poisonous cadmium seeping into the Beijiang River. Then, earlier this month, massive quantities of the cancer-causing metal found their way into the Xiangjiang River, and in Henan, tons of diesel fuel flowed out of a broken pipeline into a tributary of the Yellow River.

These accidents had more than just pollution in common. The incidents interrupted drinking water supplies in major cities and officials responded similarly: most effected residents were informed too late and journalists were banned from reporting about the accidents. But the events have proven deeply unsettling for China's Communist leaders. In December, under pressure from China's State Council, the head of the State Environmental Protection Administration, Xie Zhenhau, resigned after the Songhua River disaster. The state broadcaster reported that the administration "hasn't paid due importance to the incident, underestimated the bad influence of the incident and should be responsible for the damage."

The accidents have served to underscore the downside of the country's socialist economic miracle. This kind of secretiveness and sluggish crisis management highlight the price the Chinese are paying for their boom. Taken together, these events show that China is no longer the world's factory, it is also the world's toxic waste dump.

China's rise as a global power, achieved through flashy economic growth rates, is reminiscent of early capitalism. Everything that drives production is good, and everything that slows it down -- safety technology, for example, that prevents industrial accidents from leading to massive factory explosions -- is harmful. The result is exploding tanks, burning factories, collapsing mine pits and all manner of toxic leaks. China's deputy minister of the environment told SPIEGEL in an interview last year that the country's economic boom "will soon come to an end because the environment isn't cooperating anymore."

Now the government is pushing its new plan. But can the measures help? It's questionable. Plans similar to those approved in Beijing have already existed on the province level for some time, but they have never been taken very seriously. In Hunan, for example, politicians complain that cadmium pollution in the water has become commonplace. Nor will the plan help to address China's greater problem. According to government studies, as many as 70 percent of Chinese lakes and rivers are polluted and at least 360 million rural residents do not have access to clean drinking water.