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Drive for Clean Air Creates Chaos, Leaves Thousands Shivering
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Drive for Clean Air Creates Chaos, Leaves Thousands Shivering

Huang Kaixi, Zhou Chen, Zhou Tailai, Li Rongde and Wu Xiao
Caixin, 2017
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Recommendation

Chinese premier Li Keqiang’s promise that the country would “make our skies blue again” is proving difficult to fulfill. December 2017 saw deadlines for a clean-air program aimed at converting three million households off coal heating – but planning failures and politicking brought chaos instead. Caixin Media’s Huang Kaixi, Zhou Chen, Zhou Tailai, Li Rongde and Wu Xiao report on the plight of the Chinese people who are paying the price of cleaner air with chattering teeth. getAbstract recommends this article to readers with an interest in China’s complex environmental, economic and public health challenges.

Summary

A new natural gas furnace stands useless while a shivering family warms its home with foraged wood. Children attend classes outdoors – in December – because their school lacks heat. Villagers and city dwellers alike secretly shovel forbidden coal into their furnaces. In Northern China, thousands are enduring subfreezing temperatures without adequate heating because of politicking and poor planning. In hundreds of villages in Hebei Province, authorities ordered households to dismantle their coal stoves, promising new gas furnaces. In some cases...

About the Authors

Huang Kaixi, Zhou Chen, Zhou Tailai, Li Rongde and Wu Xiao write for Beijing-based Caixin Media.

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