This 2009 assessment of environmental regulation of China’s rapidly growing steel industry documents China’s ineffective enforcement of weak pollution-control standards, its failure to use adequate pollution-prevention measures, and the resulting high levels of pollution.
Resources
UCI Report: China Exports Smog to United States
Study finds China-made pollution causes an extra day per year of ozone smog in Los Angeles.
Coal gas boom in China holds climate change risks
China already leads the world in carbon emissions. Things are about to get worse.
The Takeaways
As of 2009, China produces more steel than the U.S., Russia, and Japan combined, and is responsible for half of the world’s carbon dioxide from steelmaking.
Even if China’s environmental infrastructure was sound, its air and water pollution standards applicable to the steel industry are far less stringent than in the United States.
U.S. steelmakers spend 80 percent more than their Chinese counterparts per ton of steel to limit air and water pollution levels, equal to an annual subsidy for China’s mills of more than $1.7 billion.