Reflections on Recent Wu Mai (雾霾) and Viral Documentary "Under the Dome"
- Jan 8, 2017
- 1 min read
Hi all, Happy 2017!
China's New Year's gift is.... Wu Mai? Yet again, China has been plagued with intense smog and air pollution in major cities, among them my second home in Shanghai.
Recent events in China have reminded me of Chinese reporter Chai Jing. Remember her? While still pregnant, Chai Jing was told that her daughter had a benign tumor, which Chai Jing blamed on air pollution. After her daughter's birth in 2014, Chai began independent investigations into China's environmental situations and policy that culminated in her self-financed documentary "Under the Dome." Drawing comparisons to Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" and Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring," Chai's film is credited with sparking viral and widespread discussion about China's environmental policy in 2015. International observers have questioned whether it would spark China's environmental awakening.
In 2015, the film was censored by the Chinese government. (If you are in the United States, you can watch (or rewatch) her talk about the film here.) Though China's censorship of the film prevents safe, open discussion of China's environmental problems, increasing evidence points to internal government debates about whether GDP should continue to reign as the country's preferred measure of development. China made US$32 billion of clean energy deals in foreign countries through 2016, and recently promised to devote 2.5 trillion yuan ($361 billion) into renewable power generation by 2020.
Will, as Yahoo puts it, China kick the U.S.'s butt on renewable energy in 2017? What kind of climate change and energy policy will the new U.S. administration enact or repeal? Spearmint will be observing these questions in 2017.
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