SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
From where I'm standing, the city-sized Baogang Steel and Rare Earth complex dominates the horizon, its endless cooling towers and chimneys reaching up into grey, washed-out sky. Between it and me, stretching into the distance, lies an artificial lake filled with a black, barely-liquid, toxic sludge.
Dozens of pipes line the shore, churning out a torrent of thick, black, chemical waste from the refineries that surround the lake. The smell of sulphur and the roar of the pipes invades my senses. It feels like hell on Earth.
[...]You may not have heard of Baotou, but the mines and factories here help to keep our modern lives ticking. It is one of the world’s biggest suppliers of “rare earth” minerals. These elements can be found in everything from magnets in wind turbines and electric car motors, to the electronic guts of smartphones and flatscreen TVs. In 2009 China produced 95% of the world's supply of these elements, and it's estimated that the Bayan Obo mines just north of Baotou contain 70% of the world's reserves. But, as we would discover, at what cost?
Source: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150402-the-worst-place-on-earth
[Editor's note: this story is a few months old, but I think it is environmentally thought provoking; also, it was not "big news" so most here probably missed it.]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 26 2015, @06:56AM
Mmhmm, sure, regulatory guidelines. The things that get flushed along with all the other waste. Just because the US has committed similar acts of environmental pollution does not make it OK. There have been many a scandle throughout the decades, that doesn't make the existence of such a large wasteland any better. I think the real motivation behind the article is to get people to care about these types of problems. If it isn't in most people's faces then they don't know don't care. It's human nature.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Thursday November 26 2015, @03:52PM
Just because the US has committed similar acts of environmental pollution does not make it OK.
No, it is because the US has similar tailing ponds without the environmental pollution.