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In a followup to a story previously on Soylent News: https://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=18/05/17/022243
It seems that at least part of an unexpected increase in CFC-11 (an ozone depleting chemical) is due to small factories in China manufacturing the chemical for use in making Styrofoam insulation for refrigerators. The normal alternative, HCFC-141b is expensive and in short supply. The illegal factories are set up, run for a time until discovered and then move to a new location. In addition to being cheaper, CFC-11 gives a better foaming action than the ozone safe alternative.
"You had a choice: Choose the cheaper foam agent that's not so good for the environment, or the expensive one that's better for the environment," said Zhang Wenbo, owner of a refrigerator factory here in Xingfu, in Shandong Province, where he and many other small-scale manufacturers said that until recently, they had used CFC-11 widely to make foam insulation.
"Of course, we chose the cheaper foam agent," Mr. Zhang said during an interview in his office. "That's how we survived."
As it happens, a crackdown was underway in the town and moments later, four officials entered Mr. Zhang's factory, handed him a leaflet warning against a range of environmental violations, including using CFC-11, and ordered his factory closed.
"They never told us until last year that it was damaging the atmosphere," Mr. Zhang said. "Nobody came to check what we were using, so we thought it was O.K."
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/24/world/asia/china-ozone-cfc.html
(Score: 4, Interesting) by bob_super on Tuesday June 26 2018, @11:09PM (21 children)
Instantly close factories, remind people that bullets to the head happen to recidivists.
How much pollution can companies dump in US rivers/air and barely get a slap on the wrist, if anything at all, under the current EPA ?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday June 26 2018, @11:18PM
It's not just the Trump EPA - post hurricanes Katrina+Rita the gulf offshore refining capacity was decimated, so they moved it back onshore and proceeded to emit ridiculous levels of soot and all kinds of other nasty stuff over the Pasadena-Seabrook-Kemah neighborhoods of Houston (among many others, I'm sure.)
There was no repeal of the law, just an implicit suspension of enforcement, 'cause 'muricans can't live without their gasoline. Thing was, after giving the wink and nod to the gasoline refineries, all the other chemical processors in the neighborhood (and there are many) also decided to economize on their scrubber bills.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 5, Insightful) by edIII on Wednesday June 27 2018, @12:20AM (11 children)
The only thing that will change behavior in the US, is when we start billing the executive's family for the bullet we put them down with. Saving that, 10 year minimum sentences in FPMITAP.
There are zero consequences to bad behavior in the US. This is because of the absolutely toxic mantra that everything must serve the shareholder's interest. Specifically growth and lots of short term profits. Until we change that paradigm, hell bound executive scum will continue to use it as an excuse for unconscionable behavior.
With Orange Anus in charge, companies can pollute and dump whatever they want. There is no EPA now.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @01:09AM (9 children)
With Orange Anus in charge...
Please, stop... The voters brought this on themselves. Don't blame the man for winning. This what the *People* want.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @01:27AM (3 children)
The Electoral College wanted President Trump. The *People* voted for the Republican candidate, Hillary Clinton.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @12:31PM
Yeah well, it's not like nobody knew the rules going into the fight. Besides, republicans and democrats are a distinction without a difference. The *People* on each side are just as tribal as the other. Majority rule is no damn good!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @01:19PM (1 child)
The People voted for one of two evils, because our voting system is a disaster. Chances are, they wanted neither candidate.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday June 27 2018, @04:47PM
The disaster begins long before the two major parties nominate their candidate.
Google for Lesterland [lessig.org].
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday June 27 2018, @03:07PM (4 children)
Aside from the fact that he actually lost the popular vote, "this" is what a maximum of about 55% of The People want. That's the thing with democracy when you're stuck with only 2 major parties.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @04:56PM (3 children)
That's the thing with democracy when you're stuck with only 2 major parties.
You're only stuck with what the majority chooses. It's still the voters' fault for what we have today. If they want change, they have to take the initiative, not wait for mass media to spoon feed them.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday June 27 2018, @09:52PM (2 children)
It's a combination of factors.
1) Winner-take-all in the electoral college means a third party needs a REALLY strong surge of support in a state to actually win it. Third parties have a very hard time winning any states unless one of the two main parties is on the ropes. As bad as it's gotten by now, the Republicans still have like 45% of the popular vote.
2) Because of that, people get the impression that voting third party is throwing away their votes, which is somewhat accurate.
3) Any issue that resonates with a lot of the population--enough to surmount the above problem and actually win a state for a third party--is going to be co-opted by at least one of the two main parties. Cf. Hillary "oh yeah I'm totally for most of these issues too, love me Bernie Bros!"
4) Let's say the unthinkable happens and a third party actually wins the presidency/a chunk of Congress. Power corrupts, so they start sliding into the flaws of the same system. And they probably end up replacing one of the two main parties, in which case we end up back in another two-party system anyway.
5) What we really need is to slay the two-party system entirely and get something more like a parliamentary system going, where there's more than two real choices. But obviously that's not in the interest of those already in power in our government, so it's never gonna happen without blood and riots.
So sure, mister "you're all sheeple", explain what the "obvious" solution is here that it's *our* fault we haven't done yet.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 28 2018, @02:03AM (1 child)
What we really need is to slay the two-party system entirely and get something more like a parliamentary system going, where there's more than two real choices.
Maybe you should move to the UK, or Italy, or Germany, or a boatload of various Asian and African countries, or anything south of the Rio Grande for a while. There's a few parliaments full of winners!
The voters have a choice to play follow the leader, or to ignore the propaganda and take their own initiative. They have chosen the former. All their suffering is self inflicted. I wouldn't care if those people who play along were the only ones to suffer for their bad choices, but the rest of us suffer too for their arrogance and tribalism. The voters are the only ones to blame. This is why your mob rule sucks. Please, stop the blame passing. We live in a world that we made.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 28 2018, @05:48PM
The "Disagree" mod does not explain why the American system is any worse than the parliamentary system in the countries mentioned above. It is simple blame passing by the voters who don't want to make the effort to bring about the desired changes.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday June 27 2018, @09:26AM
Perhaps a more serious problem is that there are worse consequences for good behavior in an environment where rules and enforcement are a joke: you lose. You go out of business. If by getting away with cheating, a competitor is able to reduce expenses and lower prices below the expenses of rivals, and not lower the quality of their product and lose customers thereby, the rivals have limited choices: a) Blow the whistle and hope the authorities act against the cheater, or failing that, that the public believes them and acts, forcing authorities to act or themselves boycotting the cheater and paying the higher prices the honest business must charge. b) Wait the cheater out, taking losses until the cheater is caught and punished for yet more cheats. c) Use the same cheat themselves, thus eliminating the cheater's advantage, perhaps moving to a place with lax regulation where the method in question is legal. They can even turn the tables on the cheater, if the cheater has expenses related the cheat, for instance by lobbying lawmakers to soften regulations. Then the rivals can get away with that cheat, and didn't have to spend any money on the lobbying effort. Or d) Quit that business.
The most obvious cheat that would not affect product quality is to pollute like mad. Skip all the processes for cleaning up waste. Dump it straight into the nearest body of water, and damn the fisheries. However, massive fish kills do tend to get noticed, so the pollutants can't be too extreme in their toxicity, immediately killing all the fish downstream from the plant location and thus making it painfully obvious who the perpetrator is. But this cheat, ozone damaging CFCs, is the sort that can go unnoticed for a long time.
To make c) an unattractive option, regulation has to be reasonably robust. No need for extreme measures such as putting executives in front of a firing squad, if we have good rules and enforcers who are doing their jobs properly, and who have some protection from the kinds of unethical pressures large organizations can exert.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Wednesday June 27 2018, @05:03AM (5 children)
A real pleasant fantasy you have there. Those Chinese regulators didn't give a fuck until NYT reporters showed up. That was someone too big to squash. And who knows how much of it was staged? Might not have been a CFC-using factory in the first place.
Not much or they'd already be doing it. The US EPA has some teeth.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @11:45AM (1 child)
"Not much or they'd already be doing it. The US EPA has some teeth."
Well that certainly explains why there are plenty of rivers in the US that are simply undrinkable these days.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Wednesday June 27 2018, @12:19PM
Plenty of rivers would be undrinkable anyway just due to naturally occurring parasites. And the situation is vastly better than it was 50 years ago.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fustakrakich on Wednesday June 27 2018, @12:35PM (2 children)
The US EPA has some teeth.
*Not anymore*
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @09:08PM (1 child)
Its cute you think the EPA is completely dismantled, go try to make/use those CFCs here and see what happens.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @09:34PM
Looks like your panties are all knotted up again, and your overused *It's cute* meme has grown tiresome...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 27 2018, @05:07AM (1 child)
You got it backwards. Chinese companies use banned CFCs, and US ones don't. Therefore, US environmental standards are more effective.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday June 27 2018, @04:41PM
The Chinese could probably find other ways to make illegal refrigerators without using CFCs. Have they tried alternatives to CFCs for building illegal refrigerators?
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.