China

8 Ways China is ‘Winning’ on Transportation

By CC Huang, Hallie Kennan / On August 4th, 2016

As Donald Trump likes to say, “China is beating us on everything.” While that’s a debatable proposition, there is one area where China is far ahead of the United States, and that’s in resilient transportation systems.

Dams on the Wild Nujiang

By R. Edward Grumbine / On February 14th, 2011

The central government’s seven-year moratorium on dam building in the Nujiang (“Angry River”) watershed is soon to be lifted and China’s last wild river will be wild no more. Last week, the Chinese National Energy Administration announced that hydropower development was now ready to move forward on the Nu. The river that brought me to Yunnan six years ago is no ordinary river: It is big, wild, and, because of its incredibly steep drop off the southeastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau, features the most raucous rapids that I have ever seen.

Load Shedding or Load Sharing?

By R. Edward Grumbine / On September 28th, 2010

During a trip last week to Nepal to attend a workshop on climate change adaptation strategies across the Himalaya, I experienced darkness within darkness for several hours every night. I am not talking about visiting one of the poorest and least developed countries in the world, though poverty and political dysfunction are part of the darkness I mean to describe.

The Spirits of the Dead Meet Big Hydropower

By R. Edward Grumbine / On September 7th, 2010

This is the next post in a year-long series written by Ed Grumbine, professor of environmental studies at Prescott College and author of Where the Dragon Meets the Angry River. You don’t need hydroelectric dams, coal-fired power plants, or even solar-cells and wind farms to produce energy for some of the most important tasks that humans engage in.

On the Energy Front, State-censored Chinese Media Trumps U.S. Media

By R. Edward Grumbine / On August 30th, 2010

This post is the first in a year-long series by Ed Grumbine, professor of environmental studies at Prescott College and author of Where the Dragon Meets the Angry River. Only five days into a one year stay in China, I’ve already noticed that the Chinese and U.S. media don’t report the news the same way. What amazed me is that Chinese state-run papers describe China’s economic growth and energy consumption more accurately than the U.S.

The U.S.-China three legged race

By R. Edward Grumbine / On August 25th, 2010

This post was excerpted a post written for Grist by Terry Tamminen is the former secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency and is now a policy adviser and author. His latest book is Lives Per Gallon: The True Cost of our Oil Addiction. In the past few weeks, how many of us have seen (or participated in) that summer staple, the three-legged race?

Vietnam May Revisit Two-Child Population Policy

By Robert Engelman / On December 18th, 2008

The government of Vietnam will decide on December 22 whether to penalize parents who have more than two children, reinitiating a coercive population policy it abandoned in 2003. "We are considering an adjustment to our policy appropriate to the circumstances of the country," Truong Thi Mai, chair of Vietnam's Parliamentary Committee of Social Affairs, confirmed on Saturday. "The Parliament Standing Committee will decide the week after next." Ms.

Postcard from Beijing

By Terry Tamminen / On October 22nd, 2008

What do Starbucks and smog have in common? Opportunity. As I walk around Beijing, the signs of the 2008 Olympics fading into memory, I am struck by the fact that every corner has a Starbucks, not to mention other ubiquitous American iconography — Sizzler, Nike, 7-11, Hummers, and CNN to name a few. I'm also struck by the fact that the smog problem remains untamed, despite efforts pre and post Olympics to reduce pollution from traffic and smokestacks.