Policy

TransCanada Corporation, the company behind the controversial Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, is furtively planning its next steps—including suing the U.S. government—if U.S. President Barack Obama rejects the permits which would allow construction of the project to move forward, the Canadian Press reported on Monday.

"Across Ohio, fracking is expanding at a frenzied pace, into our backyards and farmlands, next door to our hospitals and schools, and into the pristine and wild acres that provide drinking water and recreational opportunities for Ohioans."

So says a letter sent by more than 100 elected officials from communities across the state to Ohio Gov. John Kasich this week, urging him "to stand up for the right of all communities to determine whether, where, and how this dirty drilling is conducted within their own borders."

Rich countries are very, very far from raising the billions they promised to help poor countries fight climate change, jeopardising the prospects of reaching a global warming deal at Paris, the world’s rising economies warned.

As a key United Nations meeting got underway, Brazil, China, India and South Africa said they were disappointed in rich countries’ failure to make good on a promise six years ago to mobilise $100bn a year by 2020 for climate finance.

This article seeks to explain why China's environmental crisis is so horrific, so much worse than "normal" capitalism most everywhere else, and why the government is incapable of suppressing pollution even from its own industries. I begin with an overview of the current state of China's environment: its polluted air, waters, farmland and the proximate causes, including overproduction, overdevelopment, profligate resource consumption, uncontrolled dumping and venting of pollutants.