Clean energy's dirty secret: the pond in China filled with toxic leftovers
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 16 апр 2022
- The mining and processing of Earth Elements in northern China has caused years of toxic leaking into surrounding water sources.
A tailings pond lies on the west of the Chinese city Baotou, one filled with a black grey sludge of toxic and radioactive material.
It is the by-product of rare earth processing - elements vital to solar energy, wind farms and other alternative energy sources. It is open to the air but worse it is seeping into the ground below, poisoning the water.
Sky's China Correspondent Tom Cheshire was followed when he tried to gather more information.
SUBSCRIBE to our RUclips channel for more videos: / skynews
Follow us on Twitter: / skynews
Like us on Facebook: / skynews
Follow us on Instagram: / skynews
Follow us on TikTok: / skynews
For more content go to news.sky.com and download our apps:
Apple: itunes.apple.com/gb/app/sky-n...
Android play.google.com/store/apps/de...
Sky News videos are now available in Spanish here/Los video de Sky News están disponibles en español aquí ruclips.net/channel/skyne...
Sky News videos are also available in German here/Hier können Sie außerdem Sky News-Videos auf Deutsch finden: / @skynewsaufdeutsch6058
To enquire about licensing Sky News content, you can find more information here: news.sky.com/info/library-sales 
Развлечения
I remember reading about these tailing ponds in the 2000s, back when reliance on rare earths was less than it is now. Clearly not in a rush to do anything about it!
Yea but the timing is weird isnt it? Now that China started taking Russias side in Ukraine, media starts to bad mouth China. Our western companies are also not shy not buy everything from China at the same time.
problem here is not with the RE technology but with absence of adequate wastewater treatment .
@Matt Kelly Yep. They need to look at something more like the nuclear industry and how the brown sites were handled starting back in the late 70s and early 80s. Actually, I believe it's still going on.
@@BerserkPublishing Nuclear will always be the answer. Only ones against nuclear are big oil, coal, and a lot of out of touch Grunes.
In Alberta Canada we have a trillion plus litre toxic sludge pond for the tar sands oil extraction thats only going away by leaking into the local environment.
Amid the Media-ocrity, this is superb and important. Thanks for the excellent work to this journalist. Conclusion hits the nail on the head.
This is literally the media.
This is the new Prison tv UK, I have uploaded the best UK Prison footage from inside our Jails. More Jail footage to come 💯
free the jews
In the USA we have over 20,000 toxic ponds !!
That's right. Detroit is ready to export some leaded water. The sign up sheet is posted in City Hall.
Toxic is not radioactive.
Yep wind power is very green. With all those toxic chemicals and the fact that gearboxes need replacing about every 7 years, and when the turbine has come to the end of its use, it can't be recycled, and basically goes to landfill.
All while slicing up vast numbers of birds. Green energy is dirty energy.
go nuclear
wind farms don't get torn down at the end of their lives, they get abandoned while the wind turbines get blown up by nature after burning nature around them down. uglier than oil derricks off the coasts except these are up close and in your face from 360º all around.
green energy cries forced europe to shut down coal plants, no russia is genociding syria and ukraine over supplying europe with russian gas. green energy activists are now eco terrorist groups, shoot on site before they incite genocide in your country!
It can be incinerated. Countries with landfills I don’t understand.
@@TheBooban Incineration creates pollution DOH
So much for clean energy..
Sales of EVs should be suspended until this problem is solved and can be made in way that doesn’t kill people
Production of internal combustion engine cars should be halted till all of the mining & oil extraction that similarly pollutes the environment is cleaned up.
@@TheFatblob25 we know how to deal with the fossil fuel pollution with catalytic converters and efficient engines- Ev are sold on the premise of being green - and they are far from it - it fact it’s a massive scandal waiting to happen
@@stuartwood5448Sure catalytic converters are great... How about fracking water pollution & methane leakage from abandoned shale oil wells? Open pit mining of tar sands oil? Bunker oil burning cargo ships spewing very dirty emissions into the atmosphere... I could go on & on.
This is a calculation of overall impacts & trade offs (over the entire life span of vehicles & their supply chains)... Electric vehicles win out in that calculation. Responsible mining of materials & recycling of batteries is the easy fix for any of these problems.
Did the problem get worse, recently?
Good reporting
profit and greed for some, cancer and lost homes for others.
yep
Your comment reminds me of Erin Brockovich's story
Sounds like thourum
If they can do that to their own country, imagine...#weatherwithyou
The problem is, once a new technology is developed, the rush to be the market leader $£$£ overturns any responsible long term planning on any environmental impacts, health reduction to the population, staff etc... risk is always played down for immediate profits along with weak planning. Most industries and big businesses then try to pay their way out of any mess, after they have fully exploited the resources £€£$s and moved on to something else. The mess is usually left to charities to clean up and donations from poor people to clean the mess up. These charities might get a million pound or maybe ten million pounds in donations from some of these big companies who try and do their bit for the clean up by supporting a good cause/PR, brand protection and good advertising. However, that is nothing from the billions taken from curating the mess in the first place.
It's the same mentality goverments apply to starting wars. At the start, it will be over before Christmas, it's the right thing, we have the technology to win this, 10 years on and lots of dead people and plenty of unplanned destruction to towns and cities, later.....goverments pay their way out of the mess.
Batteries!
Corruption 101
Even copper is becoming a rare metal all are used in solar panels and electric cars.
Electric cars have less copper in them than ice cars. The supervisory and ancillary systems required to make an ice engine run require much more wiring and multiple CPU's compared to electric vehicles, which are electrically actually much simpler.
@Jay Dee I've seen that number... Source: the copper industry. It's like the natural gas conference I was at the other week... 🙄
@Jay Dee" total wire harnesses weight of a 2018 Audi A8 adds up to 36 kg" = 77 lb
Solving one crisis we end up with another. And we have barely started with clean energy imagine 100%renewable. What ever less is imp and we humans need to learn low impact life.
I'm worried to lives of this people
Not to mention all those wind blades can’t be buried or recycled so they just pile up
New wind turbines are recyclable and already delivering... check out The Zero Waste Blade Research (ZEBRA) Project
And they are made out of Petro chem.
The blades are actually recyclable. It's just up until recently there weren't enough wind turbine blades to make it economically feasible. There are a lot of new initiatives on this front. Extreme Eco Solutions makes 100% recycle tiles from wind turbine blades for example.
Depression
The West dont have it. If the West can get rare earths, it would have the same problem. All mining has this problem.
According GREENPEACE regulations
the truth is out there
Meanwhile in Alberta the tarsands are an environmental catastrophe...
One way or another Human destination is near to an end sooner or later....
Spacesuit + ⛳ = 😌
Anw
I gotta go rest
Long day Tmrw
Next time they should have blurred their faces.
How long has the world been around? And how long is it taking man to destroy it. 😔
Elvis Presley was spotted in a caddilac that was converted to electricity
What options are we left with? Nuclear energy?
Yes BUT thourum which is the radioactive part of that pollution believe it or not there is not that much uranium left for power plants not enough to get the word off oil
Isn't China lovely?
Reasons why we need to start mining in space!
Some good points here, though none of this ever bothered the oil companies. At least once mined, these elements are recyclable, unlike fossil fuels which just “waft away!”
They are not recycled, ones elements and metals have been combined together it would be like trying to separate a cocktail into all its original components to be used over - almost impossible
@@stuartwood5448 almost, but not completely. And when it comes to electric vehicles, battery packs can have 2nd or even 3rd lives as they age in different applications.
@@wasidanatsali6374 Better than dying of air pollution from gas cars, on windless days the smog just sits there the rise in Asthma is pretty exponential
@@SlowhandGreg no that's not better. Plus, it can't scale up to completely replace oil
Wind turbines are not recyclable lol and are even more toxic than that sludge. They also just bury those in the desert when they need replaced or break down, which is often.
When I grow up I want go be a firetruck...
the us sending the raw materials to be processed there as well
China 🇨🇳 clean this disaster up! ☣️☠️😤😡
我用神秘油做甜鸭。 许多人喜欢
Chinese government employment . What a job!
The West should work with China but not depend on it. Much can be learnt from the situation with Russian oil and gas.
The Chinese would call this Anti Chinese propaganda.
Would we even have clima changes if everybody was hold to the standard of the West.
if the west start mining rare earths then they will have the exact same problem. also didnt usa backed out of paris agreement?
Green energy is the biggest country ever tried
I am sick of these fake narratives
Every one in China who find such environmental unfriendly things and the bad conducts of the a factory. They can just call the environment hotline to report this! I strongly suggest the so called “journalist” here to do more homework rather than repeat the same cliché and reinforce the same prejudiced stereotypes. Try to report something constructive and relevant and urgent now! Say Japan is threatening to pour their radiation waste water into Pacific Ocean!
sky is the best reporting on earth but knows nothing about saving face in asia it seems.
Duped
Rare Earth metals are actually common in everywhere but Europe. Europe is the Peninsula of Asia is why.
Let it flow down to India
So?
Clean energy is just some kind of scam.
Green energy! Ha no such thing as
Ooh, ok, pandemic prevention control.. Hmm😊
This is a direct result of our battery powered everything battery powered cars mainly..... Yet our fossil fuel vehicles don't have this and our oilfield workers in America are paid well
👎🏻😡
Democrats say this isn't real
Tell this to climate warriors in the west. They just don't see the full picture.
well its china, need more nuclear anyway
Actually, this is a tiny fraction of the problem caused by oil and gas extraction. So, if the problem is smaller, that makes it a solution. Of the trillions of dollars of your taxes that are given as subsidies to the fossil industries, if a tiny amount of that was used for cleaning up this waste we would all be better off. Then cut off the fossil subsidies and use those for food and medicine, and make the fossil industries clean up their mess.. Wait, they can't as it's near irreversible.
Ah of course, it's the climate activists who don't see the bigger picture. When microplastics are in our blood from 100 years of contaminated sea water, when aridification and coastal flooding is going to cause a famine that will affect billions :)
Has it sunk in yet that the costs for progress were not paid back in your favour? That the only people that are going to pay for this is yourself? The rich have their bunkers to wait this out, the rest of us peons will get to enjoy famine, disease overcrowded cities and wars fought over water and all-round an ever increasingly hostile planet, perhaps even extinction like the group "extinction rebellion" claim.
what technology does not produce toxic waste ? please state.
Dreaming technology ?? 😁
This why, no country want to extract this rare-earth.
China sacrifice to do this..
Every glory need sacrifice...
They don’t have to pour it all over the ground, whats up with that? Everything can be processed safely if they wanted to do it. It just costs money. Let EV costs triple the price then.
There is a lot of information regarding safe production, that could have been set up from the beginning, now it will cost a whole lot money to clean up a toxic problem.
There are so many amazing things going on in China where you'd think they were great and talented people, but none of this is reported by Sky, only things to knock them down by. I sense there is a sense of jealousy. The Western media has so little to report in the way of UK industrial progress that it can only find dirt on others, whether true or not. By the way, China's renewable energy plan is doing very well and much new technology is being created over that way.
Sounds like this is written by the ccp 😂
@@stillsmokinr1164 it is, empty, new account. probably a troll getting mad.
Chinese state media does a skewed enough job of pushing out a positive image of the CCP's (not China's) actions. Its standard policy in the mainland to view anything negative about the CCP from the international press as biased, and anything negative about the CCP from independent Chinese media as being run by "foreign forces".
@@stillsmokinr1164 I'm English - lol!
I lived in china ...the only advancement in Tech was done through stolen IP and reverse engineering......Han are only good at copying.....
(4-148)
Allah loveth not the utterance of harsh speech save by one who hath been wronged. Allah is ever Hearer, Knower.
[4:149]
If ye do good openly or keep it secret, or forgive evil, lo! Allah is ever Forgiving, Powerful.
[4:150]
004.150 Lo! those who disbelieve in Allah and His messengers, and seek to make distinction between Allah and His messengers, and say: We believe in some and disbelieve in others, and seek to choose a way in between;
[4:151]
Such are disbelievers in truth; and for disbelievers We prepare a shameful doom.
[4:152]
But those who believe in Allah and His messengers and make no distinction between any of them, unto them Allah will give their wages; and Allah was ever Forgiving, Merciful.
[4:153]
The people of the Scripture ask of thee that thou shouldst cause an (actual) Book to descend upon them from heaven. They asked a greater thing of Moses aforetime, for they said: Show us Allah plainly. The storm of lightning seized them for their wickedness. Then (even) after that) they chose the calf (for worship) after clear proofs (of Allah’s Sovereignty) had come unto them. And We forgave them that! And We bestowed on Moses evident authority.
[4:154]
And We caused the Mount to tower above them at (the taking of) their covenant: and We bade them: Enter the gate, prostrate! and We bode them: Transgress not the Sabbath! and We took from them a firm covenant.
[4:155]
Then because of their breaking of their covenant, and their disbelieving in the revelations of Allah, and their slaying of the prophets wrongfully, and their saying: Our hearts are hardened - Nay, but Allah set a seal upon them for their disbelief, so that they believe not save a few -
[4:156]
And because of their disbelief and of their speaking against Mary a tremendous calumny;
[4:157]
And because of their saying: We slew the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, Allah’s messenger - they slew him not nor crucified him, but it appeared so unto them; and lo! those who disagree concerning it are in doubt thereof; they have no knowledge thereof save pursuit of a conjecture; they slew him not for certain.
[4:158]
But Allah took him up unto Himself. Allah was ever Mighty, Wise.
[4:159]
There is not one of the People of the Scripture but will believe in him before his death, and on the Day of Resurrection he will be a witness against them -
[4:160]
Because of the wrongdoing of the Jews We forbade them good things which were (before) made lawful unto them, and because of their much hindering from Allah’s way,
[4:161]
And of their taking usury when they were forbidden it, and of their devouring people’s wealth by false pretences, We have prepared for those of them who disbelieve a painful doom.
[4:162]
But those of them who are firm in knowledge and the believers believe in that which is revealed unto thee, and that which was revealed before thee, especially the diligent in prayer and those who pay the poor- due, the believers in Allah and the Last Day. Upon these We shall bestow immense reward.
Sorry but there is no god, plain and simple!
How old was his wife again ?
This happens in the us more than China
No it does not. In the Early 1980s changes were made.
The Chinese troll is speaking.
@The Mandarinian The creek where I grew up used to be every color of the Rainbow. By 1990 it was clean and things live in it again. 3rd most polluted body of water in the US. I grew up with smog. By 1990 no smog.
@MrHolyKindness Hahahahaha. I'm surrounded by Japanese Factories in Kentucky.