Nearly a third of the
surface water in Shanxi, China's biggest coal producing province, is so
polluted that it cannot be used by humans, the local environmental watchdog
said in a notice on Wednesday.
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| China, Shanxi province. Coal Ash, the solid byproduct of burning coal, is China's largest source of solid waste. After burning, the chemical compounds in coal become far more concentrated in coal ash than in raw coal. Lab tests by Greenpeace found more than 20 different heavy metals and chemicals in the coal ash samples. Ash is carried by wind over long distances, the heavy metals seeps into groundwater as well as rivers, and can easily contaminate the food chain. ©Zhao Gang/Greenpeace. |
Reuters
report continues:
The
Shanxi Environmental Protection Bureau said in a report that 29 out of the 100
surface water sites tested in the first three quarters of 2016 were found to be
"below grade five", which means that pollution levels are so high
that the water has "lost functionality".
China's
water is graded into five categories. Grade three and above is deemed safe for
direct human contact, while grades four and five can only be used in industry
and agriculture.
While
there have been slight improvements compared to the first half of the year,
Shanxi is still falling behind its targets, the bureau said.
It
said 11 sites had shown improvements compared to last year, but eight had
deteriorated, including five spots in the major coal-producing city of Datong,
which were found to have fallen "below grade five" over the period.
According
to the Ministry of Environmental Protection's latest analysis of water quality
on major rivers published this week, 22 percent of samples from 146 sites
nationwide was found to be grade four or worse.
Shanxi produced 944 million tonnes of coal last year, more than a quarter of the national total, and decades of overmining in the province have damaged underground water tables and contaminated ground water supplies.
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