Romania has had mining effluent contamination of water from seepages of cyanide and traces of heavy metal content that ended up in several rivers. Air quality is poor. In Bulgaria, still widespread is the sorry business of old mining and metallurgical operations. Bulgaria is said to have the most polluted air in Europe right now. In relation to the environment, industrial cities like Pernik and Burgas are ghastly places. Hungary is also too reliant on coal and other fossil fuels for energy. As well, Macedonia is overly-dependent on fossil fuels and has bad air pollution. Estonia has a very large carbon footprint relative to the size of their population. Emissions increased a whopping 15% in 2007!

In short, these countries are too energy inefficient and burn too much high-carbon fuel. This exacerbates unacceptably the throw-off of greenhouse gases and soot from poorly-combusted and dirty fuels. Latvia derives nearly three-quarters of its electricity from hydropower and is a relatively benign case compared to the others here.

In Turkey, unchecked mining activity near watershed areas has taken its toll to the point where there are unsafe levels of arsenic in the water supply of countless cities and towns. Specialized water treatment facilities are now being purpose-built to deal with the arsenic problem. Moreover, the supply of water is a grim issue. Lake Tuz, once Turkey's second largest lake, has completely evaporated or been used up. The lakebed area is now so salty trees wilt. Surprisingly, more than one-quarter of Turks still do not have access to toilets and sewage facilities, a shortage of water being one good reason why. Turkey remains far behind any pretence of implementing and enforcing European environmental standards. Turkey is now pursuing wind and solar energy projects with determination and that could not have happened too soon because they have been laggards in developing renewable sources of energy.

In Afghanistan, Yemen and Somalia there is widespread use of, interest in, and economic dependence on opium or qat. Especially in Afghanistan and Somalia, there has also been much civil disobedience, clan rivalry, war-lording, violence and corruption that complicates and delays problem resolution. Institutions are often lacking. Somalia is really in a sorry state now with up to 3 million very hungry people desperate for help.

Kabul has serious air pollution most of the time and several other cities in Afghanistan are becoming worse. There is dust, sewage and burning of all things from garbage to wood, coal and rubber. Afghanistan and Yemen have legions of dilapidated vehicles that still fill up with leaded gasoline.

The people of overpopulated Yemen generally do not know if its better to remain inland and face food and water-borne illnesses and insecticide pollution, or to head towards the coast and risk contact with vector-borne disease such as malaria. Organ failure is rife from contaminants and disease. Medically, kidney ailments are worsened by lack of water. Average life expectancy for all these countries is somewhere in the range of 45 to 60 years. Fresh water and arable land is also scarce in Djibouti. The ecology prevailing here cannot support the existing population.

Flood-prone Sudan has significant desertification and water shortages from decades of less rainfall supporting more and more people. Ancient wood-fuelled brick-making practices make a bad situation that much worse as woodlands are progressively stripped. In the absence of increased outside help, food inflation and scarcity has the potential to escalate into widespread social unrest, conflict and famine in either or all of these countries. Given the racial tensions and atrocities that have taken place in the Sudan, it cannot absorb any more stressors.

Deforestation is not as serious in North Korea but they have aged, inefficient, sunset industries and much water pollution. Sometimes food supplies have been a question mark.

In Pakistan, merely to get from a to b in places like Karachi, Rawalpindi and Peshawar, a motley collection of motorcycles and two-stroke, 3-wheel motor rickshaws eject ghastly plumes of poisonous air as if there were no tomorrow. In Lahore, they burn tires as fuel. In Islamabad, people burn garbage to get rid of it. Old diesel-burning trucks add to the pall of pollution in many population centers as does the burning of solid waste. Agricultural waste runoff, discharges of untreated sewage and industrial effluents are also big causes of pollution. Lastly, we have Pakistan becoming something of an electronic junk wasteland. The open smashing and burning of old computers may well result in release of toxic substances like phosphor dust and mercury from the monitors and carbon monoxide and dioxins from burning plastics that were likely treated with flame retardants when manufactured.

Pesticides and insecticides banned in many countries are still used in Pakistan. Consequently, there has been growth and spreading of aflatoxins into feed stocks sufficient to cause poultry and even large animals like buffalo to die. Environmental hazards are making large numbers of people sick long before their time with communicable diseases at the forefront of maladies. Deforestation, soil erosion and desertification add to their afflictions. Even though most agricultural land in Pakistan depends on the Indus River for water, the volume of water available is likely to diminish in future due to increased melting of Central Asian mountain glaciers. There already have been shortages of potable water which may be expected to occur chronically across large areas of Pakistan. The majority of Pakistani's do not have access to water fit to drink. Over one million Pakistani's die each year from water-borne diseases including as many as one-quarter of a million young children from diarrhea-related complications of drinking or using untreated water. Also, we have had widespread gastroenteritis outbreaks.

South Africa is currently the biggest-polluting country in Africa. Maps of this region already depict the presence of lingering atmospheric brown clouds reflecting the high concentration of certain potentially life-threatening pollutants. Happily, South Africa's environmental laws are set to become much tougher including the prospect of jail time for those that wantonly pollute. South Africa has a huge mining industry and to date still relies on coal for almost 90% of its energy needs. However, the government has moved in July, 2008 to end industry and consumers living off the avails of dirty coal. Projecting a business-as-usual approach to 2015 would result in about a four-fold increase in greenhouse gas emissions from the level we are at now, not to downplay the impact of a variety of other pollutants they discharge. The status quo answer is clearly unacceptable.

Rather, South Africa needs to move fast to reduce use of coal and accelerate development of renewable sources of energy. So far, we hear they are redoubling their effort to go nuclear, apparently planning to rely on a series of smaller nuclear reactors. Clearly, reacting to emissions levels and other pollutants by 2050 is way too late. Capping emissions in the 2020 to 2025 time frame is questionable. South Africa is planning for 15% of its electricity to come from renewable sources by 2020. We flatly disagree that a proposed carbon cap-and-trade system for South Africa would be a more efficient, cost effective, transparent or efficacious mechanism for curtailing greenhouse gas emissions than the global externality tax or tariff (GET) we describe before this portion of our Eco-Table. South African companies are set to be able to reduce tax owing by reducing their greenhouse gas emissions.

Even idyllic Cape Town is said to have more threatened species of plants than any other metropolis in the world. South Africa's bluebuck antelope is long gone. Try visiting Durban a mostly-ancient manufacturing hub where ghastly releases of chemicals from refineries including flaring, dumping and spillage of hydrocarbons have led to serious health problems for its citizens. Cancer cases are mounting and are increasingly being attributed to people routinely inhaling known carcinogens such as benzene, dioxins and mining and smelter byproducts such as mercury. The risk of inundation due to rise in sea level is also quite serious here. Metal processing dust and effluents are also affecting human health in places such as Port Elizabeth. Drink the water or breathe the air there and you could well inhale or ingest a laundry list of metallic elements such as manganese, selenium, nickel, copper, zinc, mercury, thallium, chromium, and more. There also exists significant contamination from nitrates in the vicinity of platinum mines. Total dissolved solids content of water may be so high that the water is not drinkable or cannot be used for irrigation.

Further, acid mine drainage (AMD) arises due to oxidation, leaching, dissolution and leaking from extensive metal mining and mineral lease areas. This results in the water flowing from there having various metal content and coal residues. Acidic water also overflows from old mine workings, cavities and drill-holes. Often, the consequences of AMD are contaminated wetlands, waterways and groundwater. For example, the devastating effects of AMD can be seen by the dead fish, reptiles and other life-forms that once thrived in the Olifants and Wilge Rivers. The rivers are reddish in color from the onslaught of acids. Clearly, planning more mines within river catchment areas is going to make things worse. The Vaal and Umgeni Rivers are also seriously polluted.

Nigeria is especially known for deltaic and offshore oil production. It also has this unconscionable gas flaring yoke to resolve involving the wasteful generation of huge amounts of carbon dioxide and methane not to mention the hideous waste of a fuel. A fine soot coats everything within range of plumes of pollution emanating from the flares. Only Russia wastes and pollutes more by flaring gas. We'd courier a legal notice to the operators' to shut down the offending wellheads within 48 hours until same are tied into Nigeria's natural gas pipeline grid.

Nigeria also has legions of oily-fuel-driven moped-style motorbikes fouling the air. In Lagos there are problems with carbon monoxide, particulates, ozone and more. Lagos is apparently taking the lead on vehicle emissions tests which should result in the sidelining of many dirty, inefficient internal combustion engines on wheels. Lead-based household paint is the primary culprit now being fingered for the widespread elevated levels of lead in peoples' blood. This overexposure to lead is prevalent especially in the bloodstream of children.

Deforestation has been out of control, proceeding at the rate of more than 3% per year of what's left standing. Some say there are precious little forested areas left in northern Nigeria. Further, borderline-dry agricultural lands here could be tipped into becoming barren, unproductive areas as a consequence of the average ambient temperature rise associated with global warming. On the desertification front, the hour is late; an estimated one-third of previously arable land has already become desert. Additionally, agricultural productivity decline affects still-arable land in the country. All told, the likelihood of there being a drop in domestic food production clearly has potential to wreak havoc with the populace.

The Nigerian government has already implemented a massive afforestation seedling planting program involving millions of trees each year. So far, however, this effort has not solved the problem. They are going to try reforestation with fruit-bearing vines and trees with hopes the local people will see considerable value in nurturing them to maturity. The Sahara Desert advances south by about half a kilometer or so each year but hopefully a green wall or corridor in the north of the country can eventually slow or stop further desertification there.

Throughout rural Nigeria, only about 15% of people have water suitable for drinking and cholera is still of near-epidemic proportions in most places. As if all this does not sound chaotic enough, Lagos, now home to 15 million people, is on average just five meters above sea level. Storm surges routinely involve waves up to three meters or so high, leaving a margin of only two meters for about half the population of the metro area. Trouble looms more immediately for the parts of Lagos that lie below global sea level now. As the useful land area to live on diminishes, one could pin hopes on people moving and the population declining. But, oh no, Nigeria demographically has one of the highest fertility rates of all countries, at about 5.4 children per woman.

The script regarding the toxic waste and biological sludge dump in Lagos called Surulere unfolds like a cheap, zero star horror flick that becomes real. We do not know how anyone could sleep at night living anywhere near such a bizarre cesspool. We advise authorities to ensure all mayhem and potential plagues that could arise from this slagheap of medical refuse, excrement and otherworldly creepy crawlers comes to a full stop now.

In United States, coal-driven plants still provide over 50% of electricity generated and account for about one third of all greenhouse gases each year in USA. The Energy Information Administration has reported that coal is still expected to provide nearly half of America's electric power even in 2030. There is also the serious problem of what to do about the innumerable coal ash dumps from legacy production of coal. Over time, some of the contents of these ponds including a variety of toxic compounds are being leached out. In principle, tax-exempt bonds can still be used to finance coal power plants. However, increasingly, many applications for new coal-driven power stations are being blocked or delayed by various legal actions and the court system. Nation wide, coal-fired power generation is still responsible for as much as 40% of mercury emissions and 60% of sulfur dioxide emissions. However, nitrogen oxide from coal-powered plants must be reduced in 2009 and sulfur dioxides must be curtailed further no later than 2010.

Historically, acid rain has been a big problem in USA. That particular phenomenon was remedied to a significant extent in recent years but cleaning up abandoned mines remains a big task. Now again however, pollution from oil refineries, including sulfur, is likely to increase markedly in US if heavy crude is used as feedstock unless use of these dirty, sour inputs is cut back or halted, at least in some areas. US refinery operators currently plan and are undertaking some $50 billion of capital investment for new refineries, refinery expansions, retrofitting and conversion of conventional crude refineries so they can process heavy crude input from Canada and Venezuela. Not a good idea.

Given the scale of the US economy and the extent of trade, pollution is also vast from bunker fuel-burning ships entering their waters and diesel trucks rumbling in and out of port areas. Those emissions cocktails includes plenty of soot, particulates, nitrogen and sulfur oxides and nitryl chloride. Stricter diesel-powered emissions rules for the future have recently been announced in USA affecting vessels, boats and trains. Cruiseliners, tanker and container ships anywhere near California must operate on low-sulfur diesel fuel.

Due to new federal government standards set, greenhouse gas emissions emanating from and the fuel efficiency of cars and light trucks both will have to improve markedly before 2016. Across fleets, an average of 35 miles per US gallon of fuel is required. We very much look forward to the realization of a nation-wide, smart power grid and to one million plug-in hybrid electric or electric cars being on the roads in America before 2016.

Further, California has regulations mandating a reduction in the carbon content of transportation fuels by 2015. This was the first low-carbon fuel standard we knew of. It recognizes the significant carbon footprint associated with first generation ethanol. This ethanol also utilizes about four times the volume of water as ethanol produced to process it from starch which is a concern. California has also pushed for a hydrogen highway including a network or hydrogen-fuelling stations. We are dismayed that these incredible liquid hydrogen and hydrogen fuel cell powered vehicles are ready-to-go, however, potential owners in virtually every jurisdiction are still waiting for hydrogen service depot infrastructure so drivers can get from point to point before they run out of fuel. Fluorinated gases are also being regulated, use of which is being cut back. We are also fired-up about California's leading-edge green chemistry initiative. It will reveal to consumers to what extent the design, manufacture, transport and use of a product is environmentally friendly. California are also pushing for 33% of its grid-electricity to be derived from renewable sources before 2020.

Other states such as New York and Massachusetts are also already far-along the green path. We have emerging ones, too such as Michigan, New Jersey, Iowa, Florida, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada and Minnesota where there have been bold moves to try to ramp up use of renewable energy faster. Texas is likely to become a prime area for wind-generated power and solar energy too. Presently, however, Texas has a very problematic chemical soup of fossil fuel combustion emissions, petrochemicals and more to contend with.

The American Lung Association has gathered much data on metropolitan statistical areas in United States. Los Angeles and Pittsburgh have the most polluted air overall among major cities according to their analysis. Particulates plague those cities plus other ones including Birmingham, Cincinnati and Detroit. Ground-level ozone has also been problematic in USA particularly in congested areas on hotter days such as Los Angeles, Houston and Dallas, due to high levels of volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides. The newly-recognized phenomenon of cold weather ozone emanating from natural gas fields or gaseous oilfields is unwelcome news. Apparently, anywhere that particular well-bore drilling chemicals mix with gas fumes from the vicinity of those types of wells plus snow-reflected sunlight leads to creation of very high levels of ozone.

In the US, there has been a practice of allowing heavy industry such as cement kilns to burn rubber tires as a fuel source which clearly adds to pollution woes. Tire burning releases soot, dioxin and other noxious gases. Cement-makers have also released too much mercury, particulates and hydrochloric acid. There are also many fuel inefficient vehicles still on the roads in these jurisdictions and plenty of whimsical driving. Plus we obviously have lots of flights that involve US locations. Jets worldwide add several percentage points to the global tab for greenhouse gases.

US continental shelf areas have extensive anaerobic dead zones attributable in large measure to fertilizers, pesticides and other chemical runoff originating inland that ends up in the Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic or Pacific Oceans. Unnervingly, PCB's, DDT, other pesticide residues, dioxins, mercury, arsenic, boron and more still show up in many US rivers with unacceptable concentrations even though PCB's and DDT were banned long ago in the US. US Environmental Protection Agency now has compiled a most-wanted list of environmental fugitive types which can only help enforcement of existing laws, rules and regulations. It's also ready-to-go to regulate major greenhouse gases if it comes to that but legislation may very well take the place of that eventuality.

 We like the competitive auctions implemented in the US to boost the geothermal energy segment. Various entities have been moving aggressively developing wind power, solar power, geothermal and different biofuels. If biomass including ethanol is tallied up along with other renewable sources, the US now has clean energy for about 7% of its overall energy needs. We harbor little doubt USA will move through the ranks of countries in this table as it incorporates space-age technologies into the mainstream. How fast they achieve that is an open question. With legislation pending, USA is currently targeting being about 4% below 1990 levels of greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 whereas in 2008 they were about one-sixth beyond their 1990 total. This target equates to being 17% below 2005 levels of their greenhouse gas emissions.

In terms of absolute capacity, US is already the world's largest wind power but that total is still modest compared to its overall energy use. Wind currently accounts for only about 2% of their grid power. However, US now has rules for offshore wind and wave development which will spur development activity. The Department of Energy has said it's conceivable wind-driven turbines could comprise 20% of electric power generation in US by 2030. USA is aiming to double its use of solar and wind energy by 2012 and to have 25% of energy come from renewable sources by 2025. The vast majority of electrical generating capacity being newly-added these days is powered by either renewable sources or natural gas. USA is also world leader in geothermal electricity generation.

Collectively, 10% of electric power is to come from renewable sources by 2012. A legal standard is in the process of mandating that at least 15% of all power from utilities must be derived from renewable sources by 2020 plus a 5% improvement in energy efficiency. We do have an ugly compromise on the carbon markets front whereby 85% of cap-and-trade permits are to be given away initially as opposed to being auctioned. So now various industry segments are jockeying for, and mounting a variety of pressure plays to grab, "their fair share" of freebies while it lasts.

It's great that USA is moving aggressively towards a comprehensive climate change solution. A recent geophysical paper is now raising the specter of much greater coastal submergence risk in the long run in US than previously had ever been articulated. East coast cities including Boston, New York, Jacksonville and Miami are especially vulnerable to ongoing rise in sea level from polar ice cap melting. It makes for rather spooky reading and we hope someone finds a flaw in their data, analysis and/or hypothesis rather than having to think of things like alteration of the Earth's axis of rotation as a result of catastrophic ice sheet melting.

Qatar is a small but highly industrialized country that creates emissions at a rate about three times higher than United States on a per capita basis. In particular, carbon dioxide releases into the atmosphere on a per person basis are said to be the highest of any nation. Some of their heavy industry has had lead, cadmium and mercury contamination issues. Oman is likewise operating and consuming far beyond the ecological carrying capacity of its useful land base. Oman, however, does have peridotite rocks in abundance at the surface which, upon contact, naturally converts carbon dioxide present in the air into various mineral solids.

Kuwait and United Arab Emirates have especially high externalities on a per capita basis for their societies to contend with as a result of industrialization, cement, construction, urbanization and use of more and more vehicles. There are high levels of noxious nitrogen oxides in the air from dirty oil-fired power generation. Use of energy is excessive in everything from big, gas-guzzling vehicles to various luxuries such as air-conditioned beach sand and bus shelters. Plus there is the ever-present problem of where do you dump garbage that is not reused or recycled? Reckless dumping of oil sludge and releases of methane gas has added to their environmental woes. In Ajman, there's a colossal dump-and-burn site for pretty well any kind of waste you can imagine. It has become clear that the associated air, water and soil contamination is making people who live not-far-away sick. On the bright side, of course we are going to love Masdar City and UAE's emphasis on capturing solar energy. UAE aims to reach 7% of all electric power in the country being driven by renewable sources of energy by 2020.

Trinidad and Tobago greenhouse gas emissions are also way too high on a per capita basis from sources including oil refining, liquefied gas, petrochemicals, cement, construction and of course, shipping, air travel and other modes of transportation. So we would not want to see rubber tire burning, too.

One-sixth or so of the land area of Egypt, including Alexandria and Port Said, is said to be at high risk of being submerged due to a sea level rise of no more than about one meter, a distinct possibility before 2050. This would likely involve transgression of the Mediterranean Sea across an average of about 65 kilometers of land parallel to the current coastline. Very little of Egypt's land is arable and most of that is near the Nile Delta which, according to the aforementioned scenario, would also be partially-submerged to the tune of perhaps 15% of its current extent.

Egypt also has a challenging air pollution problem especially near metropolises. Mass transit in major cities would help immeasurably as would reducing a three-quarters share of fossil fuel use to power their production of electricity. Renewable energy should be a big phenomenon here. Mere conversion of various plant and equipment to natural gas from higher carbon content fuels is not by itself going to resolve issues connected to, or impacts arising from, global warming. We suggest the ancient agricultural practice of burning leftover rice straw following harvesting should instead be to gather up the remains as feedstock for production of a new bio-fuel. Civic garbage is routinely burned by residents and businesses. Cairo has an appalling problem with sunlight-dimming atmospheric brown clouds, ugly carcinogenic mixtures of soot, black carbon, lower stratosphere (bad) ozone and other particulate matter that persists. Its air quality is said to be the worst of any city in Africa.

In 2007, despite having in place an elaborate safety system including sirens and refuge towers, Bangladesh suffered a major cyclone that resulted in huge loss of life, chaos and the displacement of tens of millions of people. If you live on or near the Sundarbans, the world's largest (Ganga-Brahmaputra) delta that traverses Bangladesh and southeast India, you are already a victim of climate change. The southern islands here are already progressively-dipping beneath encroaching saltwater, shrinking available arable land not to mention a place to live. 20% of Bangladeshi's land area could be lost by mid-century due to transgression by the ocean and flooding events. Bengal tigers in the area do not like this "squeeze play" either and are becoming nastier towards people.

A combination of global rising sea level and deltaic subsidence fuels the rate of submergence. Ongoing subsidence in many inland and coastal areas around the world occurs due to a myriad of factors. Factors include increased sediment load, increased structural load from cities, saltwater ingression and progressive loss of support from fresh water once contained underground. Due to the complications, the dynamics here are most often left out of equations about climate-change-induced global rise of sea level. In Bangladesh, ground water tables are increasingly being depleted to lower and lower levels as more and more people search for and utilize fresh water from aquifers. According to the government of Bangladesh, it plans to plant 100 million trees as a natural way to try to reduce the negative impact of storms, tidal surges, floods, salt incursion and droughts. Bangladesh is now also aiming for 10% of electricity to be derived from renewable sources of energy especially solar power.

Arsenic contamination of groundwater including well-water is a widespread affliction, so widespread that it affects at least 30 million people. As many as 100 million people are at risk of developing arsenicosis (poisoning from arsenic). Whereas, people that opt to drink surface water are frequently afflicted with a variety of gastro-intestinal illnesses. Diarrhea and diarrhea-related diseases have reached epidemic proportions in parts of Bangladesh. With virtually any river in Bangladesh, there may be river bank and estuary erosion and switching morphology at certain times of the year thereby displacing nearby residents and spreading the polluted contents of the river onto the adjacent land areas.

Chemicals and waste dumped into rivers in Bangladesh include DDT, other pesticides, animal hide and skin trimmings, grime, grease, oil, chlorine, mercury, chromium, sulphate, ammonia and copious amounts of chemical fertilizers from agricultural run-off. The Buriganga River is said to be close to being devoid of life. Other rivers such as the Shitalakshya, Turag, Balu, Bhairab and Norai are also ecologically null and void, having virtually no dissolved oxygen content to sustain life forms. These rivers are black, not blue, and often have the consistency of motor oil. In and around Hazaribagh, a center for the dyeing, tannery and textile industry, the water is really not water at all. Rather, it's an abominable chemical concoction of agricultural chemical residues, poisonous industrial liquid waste and other effluent, residential solid waste, other garbage and raw sewage. Other industrial centers such as Narayanganj, Gazipur and Tejgaon are nearly as odious. Living organisms including us are mostly water. We need fresh water every week to survive. What future do the people have here if water quality is this pathetic?

Cities such as Dhaka are plugged with old-junk buses and trucks that belch noxious fumes from diesel fuel combustion. The concentration of lead in the air in Dhaka is an order of magnitude greater, that is ten times greater, than the environmental standard set. So we have very high levels of particulate matter mixed in with carbon monoxide, formaldehyde, cyanide, polycyclic organics, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen dioxide, lead and sulfur. Another big contributor to air pollution is indoor cooking and the open venting of scads of brick kilns burning wood, coal, charcoal, dung, crop residues, polythene and even rubber tires. Further, particulates have been blamed for kidney and lung diseases including cancer.

About two-thirds of Russian cities are afflicted with high levels of air pollution. Radioactive and otherwise toxic chemical sites, persistent organic pollutants, pesticides and other noxious chemicals are very evident especially in a place such as Dzerdjinsk. Norilsk, a northern mining and smelting center, has historically released sulfur dioxide, nickel oxides and various other heavy metal compounds into the air sufficient to knock up to 10 years off your life if you reside there. Large fines and a clamp down on egregious-polluting offenders have only recently been initiated. According to the city administrators, 40% of St. Petersburg's raw sewage and untreated industrial waste ends up in River Neva and Gulf of Finland. A lot of garbage is still incinerated, even the toxic stuff. Volge Federal District also has many severe pollution problem areas. The Volga River is nearing ecological collapse from various wastewater injections to its watershed. Several rivers in Siberia are also heavily polluted.

The coldest days of winters in Russia are reported by the British Meteorological Office to be up to four degrees Celsius warmer than during the 1950's, only a half-century ago. In Siberia, the temperature of permafrost soil is estimated to have risen by about one degree Celsius over one generation of time. This is not a pretty situation. Over the past century, average temperatures in Russia have warmed by about one-and-a-third degrees Celsius. The effects of melting permafrost are often all-to-obvious. We also have considerable anecdotal and other evidence attesting to tree lines moving upslope in some places by many meters every year. Flood risk in Russia due to progressive global warming-related rises in sea level or from storm surge events is most dire in St. Petersburg and the Arctic Ocean-facing cities of Murmansk and Arkhangelsk.

Canada and Australia are relatively-sparsely populated but have sizeable resource-based economies that are generators of enormous quantities of pollutants. On a per capita basis, both rank among the world's worst offenders as emitters of greenhouse gases and as generators of waste generally. High levels of vehicular emissions and industrial pollutants are especially noticeable in larger, congested metropolitan areas. Rush hours stink! These countries also export vast volumes of coal, heavy oil and lower-carbon fossil fuels to China, United States and other countries.

Many, if not most, Australians live near the ocean so are vulnerable to global sea level rise and storm surges. We assume they must be eco-conscious by this point in time. Given the scorching heat and vast outback, we may be forgiven for thinking they must have been going green with solar power years ago. The country also has vast wind and geothermal energy potential. Surprisingly, this is what it has not developed. What forms of energy has it developed? Australia singlehandedly supplies the world marketplace with an estimated one-quarter of the total demand for "black" coal. If greenhouse gas emissions from export industries are attributed 50% to the exporting country, which seems reasonable to us, then Australia's per capita emissions are now way too high. Our view is that Australia's current environmental plan borders on the ludicrous: it facilitates continued unabated polluting in Australia, that is full-offsetting of emissions generated in Australia going forward by contributing funds to alleged reductions thereof in other countries. Moreover, they are set to dish out to Australian industry for free up to 90% of permits to do exactly this! Australia still relies heavily on coal for 83% of electricity generation and is showing no signs yet that it realizes what a sunset industry or segment is. Even though Australia still relies on coal for 80% of its power generation, the industry is to receive billions of dollars in payments from government in the next five years and be allowed to continue polluting virtually for free.

As such, despite the environmental calamity which also includes five years of climate-induced drought resulting in 60% reduction in grain harvests, Australia plans to 2020 have it continuing to be one of the world's largest polluters per person. The latest global greenhouse gas emissions figures for 2007 are testament to the fact pollution in Australia is ramping up dangerously not down. 2008 figures also show total greenhouse gas emissions up another 1.1%. If emissions from croplands and grasslands were included, the 2008 rise would be much greater due to drought. Increasing incidence of wildfires makes the situation even worse.

Some lakes are so short of fresh water due mainly to extended drought, the lakebeds have become laden with various toxins and acids including hydrochloric and sulfuric acid. Most native river red gum trees, some that are 500 years old, are dying off or have capitulated already due mainly to reduced fresh water volume. On the coast, Sydney Harbor is said to have seaweed with the highest levels of lead and copper contamination ever measured. The gray waters of the Murray River have reached perilous levels of pollution with acidity comparable in stretches to pure sulfuric acid. Rising salinity and acidity is affecting fish to the point where the lowly carp now constitutes about half the remaining biomass of fish that can survive there. High acid-sulfate content of soil near the Murray River is degrading vegetation and causing dead zones to form as it oxidizes into sulfuric acid, then runs off into the river. Aluminum, cadmium, nickel and iron have been found to be far beyond safe levels where the river runs into the ocean. Likely a ramification of nearby mining and smelter activity, we also have the sorry situation in the city of Mt Isa where lead-laden dust is affecting the health and welfare of many people. We have a heavy metal mine effluent ecological disaster affecting Dalpura Creek.

Australia has accounted for almost half the world's mammal extinctions over the past 200 years. Australia is now among the top five countries in total number of threatened species and biodiversity has dropped. Its apparent that many species cannot now cope with the effects of increases in global temperature, never mind 2020 or 2050. Endangered species range from certain frogs and possums to marine turtles to tree kangaroos to hare wallabies and koala bears. The current range area covered by kangaroos is predicted to be cut in half by about 2030 as their grazing areas become parched and more water holes dry out. Three-quarters of the number of shorebirds that existed a generation ago have disappeared. Furthermore, many seabirds that heretofore have depended on the vitality of the Great Barrier Reef are in big trouble. This is in part because their food sources such as fish and plankton are increasingly descending to deeper, cooler water as a consequence of global warming.

Canada produces about 2% of global greenhouse gases but has only 0.5% of the world's population. Coal power still accounts for generation of about one-sixth of all electricity in Canada. Its use is very prevalent in certain jurisdictions such as the Province of Alberta. In general, however, Canada has less problems from coal mining and burning than Australia but huge externalities from oil sands development in northern Alberta. Canada's greenhouse gas emissions have increased by 26% since 1990 and by about 4% during 2007 relative to 2006. That is quite different than reducing same by 6% below 1990 levels before 2012 which was their obligation under the Kyoto Protocol. Sadly, Canada could have been a significant wind, geothermal and solar power by now but for whatever set of reasons has repeatedly chosen to snub vigorous development of renewable sources of energy. Rather like a punch-drunk boxer never knowing when to quit, Canada staggers further down the fossil fuel road, seemingly-oblivious to the drastic consequences inevitably being emblazoned on future generations.

Alberta alone accounts for more than one third of total absolute emissions in all of Canada. That total was before consideration of the emissions from rampaging forest fires, dryness and drought that struck the prairies in 2009 for the second time in seven years. Much power still comes from using coal as the fuel source. Strip mining of the Alberta oilsands has resulted in loss of huge tracts of boreal forest and wetlands. Habitat loss is displacing wildlife. Species such as woodland caribou and millions of migratory birds are said to be at risk of displacement, endangerment or an early demise due to missing and degraded boreal forest, the implications from tar sands operations, logging and other natural resource extraction activities. Such forests could prove to be critical in combating global warming.

Tar sands operators collectively are emitting an overabundance of poisonous hydrogen sulfide gas, toxic nickel and lead particles and about three times as much greenhouse gases as conventional crude oil production. Plus, as an offshoot of mining activity, they are generating gigantic, seeping, moonscape-like "holding" ponds of toxic naphthenic acids, carbolic acid, methyl benzene or toluene (a known female reproductive toxicant) and other volatile organic compounds, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, mercury, arsenic, chromium, cobalt, other heavy metals and sulfur-laden tailings. One "holding-for-what" pond is considered to be the second largest dam structure on Earth after the Three Gorges Dam in China. Untold numbers of migratory and local birds including mallard ducks and loons have died after landing in these hydrocarbon-fouled "waters".

Tar sands operators are also using prodigious amounts of fresh water resources as if they have no value, up to about five barrels of fresh water for every barrel of heavy oil that ultimately results. Fresh water has significant inelastic demand value these days but I guess its considered to be another freebee for tar sands investors. Up to 10% or 15% of an entire river's water, the exact percentage allowed depending on the overall volume of river water flowing, can be siphoned off for use in these Neanderthal tar sands projects. Most of that water ends up in holding ponds at a later date, hopelessly polluted. Holding ponds that leak and leach, some say, billions of liters of this contaminated water every year. Interceptor ditches and wells miss containment of untold millions of liters of contaminated water every passing day, water that contains arsenic, mercury, hydrocarbons and more toxins from tailings. Where does the contaminated water end up?

Fish caught in the Athabasca River have suffered mutations, tumor or polyp growths and other deformation from dirty water. Up to one-quarter of the fish there have some kind of lesion. Whitefish may be reddish in color from ingestion of various toxins in the water. Apparently, the Athabasca Chipewayn and Mikisew Cree aboriginals living nearby are being afflicted with a rare bile duct cancer, the incidence for which may be attributable to pollution generated at the tar sands. There have been abnormally-high incidences of biliary tract, lymphatic system and blood cancers affecting people who live downstream from tar sand operations.

Airborne sulfur from north-central Alberta sources mostly ends up in the neighboring province of Saskatchewan where acid rain has become a significant problem. At what point does the needle in the gauge bend towards unsustainable development? Apparently not yet, as Alberta has ambitious plans for further oilsands extraction and greatly-expanded bitumen upgrading capacity. Reliable information reveals that oilsands operators collectively, far from cutting emissions and pollution, are instead on-course to escalate sulphur dioxide emissions by about one-third; increase nitrous oxide throw-offs by one-quarter; and up the out-gushing of particulate matter and volatile organic compounds by about two-thirds. All of those levels of pollution awaits us, and have been slated to occur here before 2019.

High-carbon fuels such as asphaltene, oily coke and the bitumen itself are now routinely being used in extraction and processing of bitumen. So as of sometime during 2008 for most tar sands mining operations, we now also have the consequences of wide-scale combustion of junk fuel to grapple with whereas prior to that relatively clean-burning natural gas had been used as an energy source. There is even a kind of antediluvian  production that uses dreadful pitch tar residuum as the fuel with the justification that it helps the operation save more money. As time goes by and each scoop of goop becomes incrementally-more difficult to extract, the economics deteriorate further.

What's more, net energy from the combustion-intensive tar sands after construction, strip-mining, processing, upgrading, piping, refining and transporting is not so good. Just cooking gummy, goopy tar sands in the initial extraction procedure consumes the energy equivalent of about one-third of every barrel produced. Vast greenhouse gas emissions generated from heating the bitumen have concentrations sufficiently-diffuse that its possible to efficiently capture only a small proportion of the noxious gases. Further, according to detailed studies, the life-cycle emissions totals of some greenhouse gases other than carbon dioxide actually increases by more than one-third due to the various energy-intensive processes involved in underground carbon sequestration. So much for carbon capture and sequestration. What's more, as we have outlined in numerous "Comment" sections at this website, underground carbon sequestration poses unacceptable risks and the legal ramifications are vast, murky and unsettled. The technology, monitoring and feasibility of it have not been established on a commercial scale. Further, some knowledgeable observers say less than 10% of greenhouse gases generated in oilsands mining, upgrading, piping, refining, transport and final use of this carbon-intensive product will ever be feasible to capture and store. Clearly, that would mean the public are wasting their money putting it into tar sands carbon capture and sequestration ventures because there is not likely to be a feasible way to mechanically or chemically engineer a low-tar, "light" tar sands brand of fuel.

We recognize the technology, monitoring and feasibility of hydrocarbon reservoirs with in-situ flooding and flushing of the reservoir using water, steam, natural gas, carbon dioxide or solvents to enhance recovery has been shown over the years but that is not what we are talking about here. Moreover, after about one year or so of storing carbon dioxide generated in Alberta in old hydrocarbon reservoirs, were that ever to take place, there would be no more physical reservoir capacity to store any additional volumes of captured emissions. So then what? Even companies involved in initial demonstration pilot projects of carbon storage and underground sequestration such as the Swedish utility, Vattenfall recognize that the whole effort is only a stopgap measure, that it will not be a permanent solution to the climate change imperative. Maybe they know already that more than three-quarters of carbon dioxide "stored" in hydrocarbon reservoirs has been found in the water not in mineralized rock. This means the risk of it escaping where it is stored along permeable zones, micro-seismic cracks, fractures and faults is much higher. This could be due to natural, drilling-induced or formation pressure-induced phenomena such as minor tremors or induced seismicity, faulting, fracturing, effervescence, chemical reactions or fluid mobility and migration arising from gravitational forces, heat flow, differential solubility and/or pressure gradients.

Alberta's Energy Resources Conservation Board does now have the power to shut down oilsands operators who fail to manage tailings or execute reclamation responsibilities as agreed. However, after more than a generation, only one mined area has been finally-reclaimed but in a state quite different than the original setting. Reclamation activity will at best come to a steady state where a new tailings pond can be created if an old one is cleaned up. Who is going to pay for environmental liabilities and when does it start? Incredibly, the answer appears to be the general public in Canada even though they generally do not realize that yet. Furthermore, a clear majority of Canadians are for halting oilsands expansion now but that so far does not appear to affect the intentions of the powers-that-be in Canada. Integrated oil and gas companies with significant oilsands operations such as Encana already have spun off, or are moving quickly to obtain very expensive advice and take legal action, to hive off their oilsands units we think to try to avoid the legal footprint and risk that the predecessor company will actually have to pay the very high cost of reclamation for the mess they have left behind. Also, these entities face large and uncertain costs and contingent liability for carbon capture and sequestration. They appear to be counting on burying this pollution in order to ensure the future viability of tar sands projects.

With climate-can't-change looming on the horizon as an imperative in virtually every country, it may not be long before there are no refineries left that can upgrade grimy, sulfurous heavy crude because the jurisdiction where they operate has effectively or actually shut them down. Rather than the dirty oil, we think many people in western United States would want the fresh, clean water that is forgone from the watershed once used in processing of bitumen.

Ontario is grand central station for many manufacturing and refining entities. Hamilton, Ontario is a gritty steel-making hub. In Windsor, just over the bridge from Detroit, diesel fumes accumulate in the sorry atmosphere of a mega-transit, border-crossing bottleneck for Canada-US tractor-trailer commerce.

Obviously, extensive convenience gas flaring by oil and gas company operators in northeastern BC is going to augment Canada's greenhouse gas woes. Whoever is doing it should have been taxed yesterday for it not at some distant date in future.

BC, Quebec and Manitoba's hydropower capacity have been bright spots for many years. Canada in fact has excess, exportable hydropower which also satisfies almost 60% of domestic electricity production needs. The current goal for Canada is to have 90% of electricity come from non-emitting sources by 2025 which should be attainable. However, Quebec is also home to many of Canada's most polluted rivers, the cause of which is attributed to excess fertilizer, manure, pesticides, industrial effluent and other waste that ends up in the waterways.

Canada has a big problem dealing with mining effluent. Some are dumbfounded to realize natural lakes can through some sleight of regulation be transformed as a convenience to mining interests into designated mining tailings dump sites. Just a reminder - trout and many other species of plants and animals live in those lakes and rivers, and people eat the fish. Beyond this issue, many known toxins outlawed in EU, US and other jurisdictions are still used commercially in Canada. The safety of chemicals, food, food additives and consumer products generally should be assured before same ends up in the Canadian marketplace with Canadians effectively serving as unwitting subjects in the experiments.

One entire class of common birds, the aerial insectivores are in dramatic decline in Canada. What's happening to the whip-poor-wills among others? Biologists apparently have not yet pinpointed exactly why this loss is occurring but undoubtedly could make some unsurprising inspired guesses. Our guess is it's a result of lost habitat from forests being decimated by strip-mining, other extractive industries, infestations, wild fires, and more. The situation has reached a point in Canada where observers are saying Canada's forests are now collectively considered to be a net source of, not sink for, greenhouse gases. It will take a generation to turn that around even if a concerted effort begins now.

The coldest days of winters in Canada are reported by the British Meteorological Office to be up to 4 degrees Celsius warmer than just 50 years ago. Little wonder Canadians cannot seem to kill off the pine beetle infestation which has wiped out about half of BC's trees and is still on the march in BC and Alberta. Wood-pelletizing for bio-fuel oil, production of cellulosic bio-butanol from some wood waste, non-conventional biomass processing and biochar options need to be investigated and pursued to help deal with leftover material from dead or diseased trees, sewage, other organics and materials still put in landfills. Huge, high-tech autoclaves now exist to handle some of the colossal load of garbage still generated by our throw-away society. Reduce, recycle and reuse efforts to date have really only got us part way to environmental nirvana. Pyrolysis, use of pyrolyzers and pyrolitic processes represent the new mantra in dealing with many kinds of waste, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions including recovery of methane gas for use as fuel not venting directly into the air.

Venezuela gives us a glimpse of what the end game might look like for countries that remain heavily focused on fossil fuels and minerals especially heavy oil and coal. We, of course, do not like what we see here either but let's just say red howler monkeys' genuinely have something to howl about as their numbers have been decimated in Venezuela since 2000. Last we heard, there were no glaciers left anywhere in Venezuela.

Brazil and Indonesia have more threatened species than virtually anywhere else on Earth. Deforestation and loss of habitat in tropical rainforests is an ongoing big concern not only because of endangered species but also due to the consequent reduced global capacity for uptake of carbon dioxide by plant life. Half of Sumatra's forests have been destroyed already often due to further plantation and forest industry activity. In Kalimantan and Sumatra, deforestation for agricultural and industrial development has led to countless majestic animals such as elephants, tigers and orangutans either disappearing, being on the run or some kind of rampage or holed-up in orphanages. The survivability of four of every five primates is threatened. Half or Borneo's rainforests are gone and every year some 10% of Borneo orangutans disappear, that's forever. But now we have good news and perhaps the beginning of a turnaround for Indonesia: the apparent recent agreement by all Sumatra governors to ensure preservation of rainforest and peat lands in Sumatra. The recent waste management law passed in Indonesia aims to condemn violators, fine them and perhaps also land them in jail for up to 10 years.

Brazil is home to perhaps one-third of the remaining tropical rainforests on Earth. More than 20% of the Brazilian Amazon is already gone. Some fear upwards of 50% may disappear by about 2030 along with many species of plants and animals, not to mention possible medicines of the future. Brazil remains one of the top four emitters of greenhouse gases on Earth largely due to reckless, wholesale destruction of the Amazon Rainforest. Brazil may still account for as much as one-half of global greenhouse gas emissions that arise from deforestation which would be 10% of the overall global total. Yet still, this amount only accounts for about three-quarters of emissions from Brazil so its clearly time for action and a crackdown. Having 300 "environmental agents" covering the entire Brazilian Amazon was wholly-inadequate.

The Brazilian government's current plan is to ensure more trees are planted than cut down in the Amazon by 2015. In our view, to merely cut the deforestation rate in half within a decade is totally inadequate, a nonstarter. Brazil claims it will reduce the existing prolific teardown of its forests by 70% before 2019, that's their current objective. Accordingly, special federal police and environmental agents have been sent in to try to stop illegal logging, land-clearing, sawmill operations and lighting of forest fires from escalating anew across this frontier. Authorities are apparently going after farmers and cattle ranchers that cut down trees, the industry responsible for about 80% of Amazon deforestation. Now, if you raise livestock on illegally-cleared land, your animals could be impounded. Yet, many Amazon natural resource harvestors are defiant and the rate of deforestation has so far continued to increase, wiping out huge new swathes of rainforest. We still have the Bom Futuro's and Tailandia's of the world with us. What a kafuffle.

Hydropower in Brazil accounts for about three-quarters of their electricity generation which is fine so long as Andean glaciers remain voluminous, not a given as we have pointed out. Coal use was once widespread then went into decline due to the historical rise of hydropower and, more recently, of sugar-based ethanol sources. Recently, we have become aware of information concerning the Brazilian government resurrecting construction of more fossil fuel-driven power plants. We hope it is not true. 

We also have phenomena like methane bloating livestock and sooty, sulfurous tailpipe ejections from dirty-diesel-fueled vehicles that proliferate especially in metropolitan areas like Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. In addition, there is the ancient technique of controlled burning of sugar cane fields to remove underbrush. The cost to life as we know it of this widespread practice is symbolized by the curtains of dark gray smoke that waft up into the air from the fields. Brazilians should utilize the fibrous parts of sugar cane as a second generation cellulosic bio-fuel. 

Indubitably, Brazil is an emerging agriculture power. We hope there is not an agricultural chemical-runoff pollution disaster looming on the horizon. This may be a consequence of the prodigious quantities of fertilizers, pesticides, insecticides, herbicides and fungicides applied to and lacing once-marginal cerrado land areas in an apparently-successful effort to enhance yields. Clearly, we are not dealing with quaint vegan family farmers here, rather we have mega-scale baron-like operators of agricultural complexes.

In Indonesia, rampant deforestation that, for example, pretty-well wiped out the entirety of Kalimantan's rainforests, has also now encroached into critical carbonaceous peat land areas. Both deforestation and decaying organic matter in peat lands are processes that result in huge releases of greenhouse gases. Thus peat swamp forests constitute another of our "wild cards" because peatlands, despite their rather limited geographic extent, hold about one-quarter of the Earth's soil and vegetation stores of carbon. Therefore, they should be left as unaltered ecosystems not drained or otherwise developed by economic actors. This is truly another hot potato issue.

Moreover, the emissions story is still incomplete here because Indonesia, the country with the world's largest extent of coal-bearing material, is already one-third dependent on dirty coal for electric power generation. Worse, it appears to be hell-bent on adding capacity of tens of thousands of megawatts more of coal-fired plants over the next several years such that coal burning will about double by 2011 and quadruple by 2017! This will boost their overall pollution totals much higher, into the stratosphere. They are slowly developing some of their vast geothermal potential.

Indonesia is also a very problematic user of mercury to extract gold cheaply and easily. As a consequence of mostly small-scale artisanal gold mining, Kalimantan has many waterways with high concentrations of mercury. Furthermore, according to Indonesian sources, one-third of consumer waste is burned and one-sixth is thrown into rivers or deposited on public lands. Four of every five rivers in Indonesia are said to be in the government's highest category, meaning 80% of rivers are currently listed as being severely polluted. Needless to say, do not drink the water. Nearly half of Indonesians still make-do without toilets and, unsurprisingly, most excrement and other raw sewage ends up in bodies of water. Fish and shellfish are often killed directly by the high concentration of effluents, garbage and raw sewage present.

Pollution-gushing pedicabs ply the streets despite attempts by authorities to have operators upgrade to compressed natural gas or junk it in favor of an ordinary bicycle. If Indonesians survive man-made disaster scenes they still have the ever-present possibility of earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, volcanoes, mass wasting flows and other natural catastrophes to contend with as a consequence of living in close proximity to the Pacific Rim of Fire. Jakarta is slowly subsiding, more than two meters in a generation (gulp!).

Increased urbanization and auto-mobility coupled with low income per capita and tendency of people to smoke are also big negatives for Indonesia and Vietnam. Cigarettes here are among the cheapest in the world and hordes of people gasp on them at regular intervals as if there was no tomorrow. Both those countries export large volumes of coal, in particular, to China and India. This may not be such a hot idea as we are all interconnected by the entrails of waste-streams.

Apparently undaunted by the maelstrom of pollution to date, Vietnam has been planning on quadrupling its electric generating capacity before 2020 relying mostly on coal to support that growth. We highly recommend ditching coal for alternatives like rice husks, hyacinth weeds and so on. There is also hope that their natural gas reserves can be utilized more widely, displacing dirtier diesel and petrol. However, conversion to, or use of, compressed methane is currently beyond the reach of the vast majority of individual vehicle owners in Vietnam. Industrial coal-burning activities and countless grungy, inefficient vehicles including huge numbers of old soot and dust spewing motorbikes are significant contributors to air pollution here. Major cities currently have an atmospheric backdrop of dust, grime and various combustion products. Vehicles cause almost three-quarters of the air pollution in urban areas according to environmental officials in Vietnam. Unfortunately, mass transit is limited presently.

Vietnam has also been smarting due to a decade-long drought in the north. Hopefully, the drought is not caused by global warming which would heighten the likelihood of a persistent, or at least recurring, problem. Authorities estimate that global warming of two degrees Celsius will be sufficient to cause submergence of nearly half the Mekong delta area, an event that would be a calamity of monumental proportions. We already have serious saltwater incursion up the Mekong River delta area. Ho Chi Minh City is likely in big trouble in this regard. One estimate projected that a one meter rise in sea level near Vietnam could impact 10% of the population, principally those who live or work in the extensive low-lying coastal areas of the country. Alarmingly, average temperatures in many localities have been rising at a pace of one degree Celsius per generation for two generations. The ocean impinging on Vietnam's coastline has been rising at a rate of two meters per century for more than a decade. A four to five degree Celsius temperature rise would very likely bypass some serious Earthly tipping points unleashing relatively-abrupt rises in global sea levels of several meters. Such a prospect would be so calamitous in its implications we do not want to dwell on it. Rather, we want to focus effort on stopping further global temperature increases from happening, to lower the risk that various catastrophes become inevitable.

Vietnam has seen a net gain in trees lately due to monolithic plantation-style reforestation projects but restoring biodiversity may be a long and arduous process. Acid rain originating beyond Vietnam's borders is said to account for about one-third their rainfall. The Mekong, Dong Nai, Sai Gon, Ngu Huyen Khe and several other rivers in Vietnam are in places severely polluted mostly as a result of steel-making and other industrial and agricultural sources. A 70 kilometer length of the Day River cannot support any life. Furthermore, large die-offs of aquatic life have occurred along the Nhue River. Fish have also been succumbing en masse to pollution in many lakes in Vietnam. Only about 10% of Mekong delta factories treat waste water before discharging it into the Mekong River. Use of toxic, illegal pesticides abounds. The Mekong River has been found to have very high levels of PCB's, DDT and mercury. Unsurprisingly, the Mekong dolphin is on the brink of extinction. One of the Dong Nai's streams is virtually dead in sections up to many kilometers long. The Thi Vai River has been declared devoid of life over a length of at least 10 kilometers. Industrial zones may not have water treatment plants and so may be a significant source of pollutants. The Saigon River also has acute water pollution from microbes, manganese, oil, ammonia, iron, lead, etc. Hundreds of waterways in and around Ho Chi Minh City are used as dumping areas for industrial effluents, medical waste and residential garbage. Many medical facilities have no capacity to treat waste and merely discharge it into a river. Some canals are ecological disaster scenes, are pitch black in color and rank in smell. Hanoi's water and air quality are horrible, both being laced with a variety of toxic substances. Maybe only one-third of industrial zones have even the most basic wastewater treatment facilities. Many rivers in and around Hanoi are contaminated with heavy metals and coliform bacteria. The oxygen being consumed in waterways is far beyond what's possible in order to still support most aquatic life.

In sum, chemical oxygen demand is so intense and water quality so poor in parts of Vietnam that agricultural productivity has declined significantly. Water wells contain arsenic-laced water unfit for use as gray water let alone drinking or cooking. The government is funding a plan to try to clean up rivers in Vietnam. As well, Vietnam now has environmental police so we hope various improvements are in the offing. And authorities are determined to boost Vietnam's sorry record on recycling and reuse to far beyond the 10% or so level of all garbage that its at now.

What can the outlook be given that India and China are both rapidly developing an automobile culture as affordability ramps up for huge swathes of the population and smaller vehicles are pumped-out to try and capture more of the lion's share of the personal income curve? The distinct possibility that there will be another one billion or so new vehicle drivers on planet Earth is a very unwelcome prospect. Ground-level ozone pollution is already so concentrated from burning of fossil fuels and other materials and substances that both China and India already have reduced crop yields in many areas as a consequence. Governments are starting to crack down in an attempt to roll back pollution especially from atrocious diesel vehicles but the hour is very late. As of now, vehicular and other emissions are expected to escalate, perhaps dramatically. Further, as greater and greater numbers of people desire and expect a connection to the power grid, one would anticipate a significant escalation in demand for electricity. In the so-called business-as-usual scenario ceteris paribus this implies even-greater plumes of planet-warming gases being released into the air.

Many noxious-combustion large ships add significantly to the pollution burden in Indochina as does air traffic. We agree that, if say one-quarter of China's pollutants originate from producing goods for export from China, that half that amount, one-eighth of the total, are the responsibility of, and can therefore be attributed to, other countries. By extension, the same half-half split applies to imports into China, where China then assumes partial responsibility for those goods and services. Chinese officials have said about half the rise in greenhouse gases in their country is attributable to goods and services sold to other countries. It takes two trading nations to tango and the same concepts would seem to apply to every nation.

According to projections, India will soon become the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases. There is serious deforestation, soil erosion, overgrazing and other maladies associated with huge numbers of people trying to eek out a living or subsistence from working the land. There are nearly half a billion cows, sheep and goats. Livestock are said to release more greenhouse gases collectively than vehicles. All those lovely cows, sheep and goats whose meat and dairy products are coveted for local use and export, they do have rotten table manners. Its called methanogenesis. Moreover, the agriculture-driven economy has major issues due to raw sewage, pesticides, insecticides, fertilizers including nitrates, phosphorous and other chemicals percolating or being flushed directly into bodies of water or as leachate. Pesticides and insecticides banned in many other countries such as DDT are frequently still used in India so we have cancer-stricken areas such as Bathinda. Uranium also contaminates the water there. We also have mining calamity outbacks such as Sukinda, and we have the Chanda's of the world.

The Indus, Brahmaputra and Ganges Rivers all depend on Himalayan glaciers to replenish fresh water. If that does not happen, food shortages may eventually result in reduced crop yields. Flow in the Ganges is already reduced due to damming and an abundance of irrigation canals. Near Varanasi, the volume of water is lessening and the volume of pollutants ending up in the water is increasing, not a good combination. Water table levels in many parts of India have been dropping due to the population's overuse relative to the diminishing volume of Himalayan glaciers. The climate change phenomenon is increasingly affecting the natural cycle that historically had faithfully replenished both the amount of glaciers and fresh water supply. Demand for water simply outstrips reduced replenishment and supply so ground water table levels fall.

If too much glacial melting occurs or global sea level rises more than about two meters, people living in low-lying coastal areas like Goa or cities, for example, Mumbai and Kolkata are in big trouble from the attendant flood risk. Sea level is rising faster along the east India coastline than the global average rate. Consequently, saltwater incursion from the ocean up rivers already occurs on a regular basis. West Bengal and other aquifers are contaminated with unhealthy levels of arsenic and fluoride. Perhaps the majority of people in Kolkata already drink contaminated, salty water. Some of it contains unsafe concentrations of metals such as copper, lead, iron, arsenic and chromium.

Water is generally not potable directly in India. Many locations near the Ganges River have high concentrations of arsenic in the groundwater which ultimately manifests itself in residents as any of various cancers or cardiovascular disease. Ganges and Yamuna are further polluted from discharge of untreated sewage, garbage, fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides, rodenticides, corpses and industrial effluent directly into the rivers. Chemicals and various bacteria proliferate in surface and groundwater. In Jaipur for example, the incidence of water contamination is nearly-wholesale. Don't come too close to the rivers or you may come down with typhoid, jaundice, polio, dysentery or what-have-you from contact with the spray alone. The Ganges River is in parts more like a viscoelastic fluid that oozes rather than a waterway that flows. Near and through Delhi, the Yamuna River is deathly dark and rank in smell. In various localities there are alarming levels of fecal coliforms from organic waste in waterways such that people should not be going in the water or be in contact with its spray.

India also has a problem with electronic waste piling up in certain areas of Delhi, Hyderabad, Bangalore and other places. China has poorly-controlled e-waste centers in Guiyu, Taizhou and more. A combustible chemical soup mixture of toxic elements and compounds may include lead, iron, cadmium, mercury, chromium, barium, beryllium, chlorofluorocarbons, poly-vinyl chloride residues, flame retardant chemicals and more which may show up in groundwater and other places. India and China both habitually participate in the sorry process of incinerating sometimes-imported toxin-laced refuse and other contaminated waste in order to produce electric energy and waste heat from the "fuel". We are not in favor of pell-mell burning of noxious or other materials, the sorry results of which are then back circulating in the air and water. However, for example, we do think production of biochar from wood waste and agricultural leftovers in an anaerobic combustion process has potential as long as agricultural workers and other people do not burn it openly (aerobically) instead of tilling or burying it.

Mumbai is said to be the second most polluted metropolitan area in India after Kolkata. Delhi is also a grim bastion for pollution. Delhi has horrid air quality arising from industry and vehicles. Further, there are startling instances of additional indoor toxicity, for example, from breathing the dust emanating off lead-based paint used. Cities such as Delhi still have less than 3% of vehicles running on cleaner-burning natural gas. Kolkata also has dreadful air quality with many old vehicles plying the streets. Places like Kolkata, Ranchi, Lucknow and Nagpur are also beset with carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides and suspended particulate pollution such as that arising from innumerable small-time rickshaw drivers burning junky blended fuels including kerosene and naptha. Air quality is poor. More and more children are developing chronic bronchial asthma from breathing the air, especially in the big cities where garbage and raw sewage disposal also tends to be problematic. There is lots of carbon dioxide, sulfur and nitrous oxide emitted by heavy duty diesel fuel burners and carbon monoxide from two-wheelers. We also have high concentrations of ozone at street level. Both vehicular exhaust and high levels of hydrogen sulfide emissions from industrial sources have been blamed for respiratory ailments and illnesses. Kolkata children especially are said to be afflicted with very high rates of coughing, wheezing, asthma, respiratory infection and even lung cancer attributable to breathing the air. Doctors familiar with this situation in India are saying expect to live about three years less if you live your life in Kolkata. Let's not wait any longer for solar battery-powered rickshaws to be put in widespread use! Find a way to make it happen, that's our advice. Utilize compressed natural gas or liquefied petroleum gas. Get off the high-carbon fuels entirely.

The Jatropha shrub is now being seen in India as a hardy, reliable source for biodiesel to power trains, buses, trucks and more. Certainly, India has the potential to be huge in development and use of renewable sources of energy. Worldwide, India already is ranked fifth in wind-driven power generation capacity. Obviously, the sun is intense throughout most of India so solar power should be a go, too!

Pollution aerosols and smoke from China comprise an estimated 13% of overall emissions currently in the air in North America, arriving by way of the East Asian airstream. In China, there are now alarming levels of greenhouse gases, sulfur dioxides and particulates caused by rampant coal-fired electricity generation and hoards of dirty diesel fuel powered trucks. Acid rain afflicts one-third of China. By some analysis, due to the prevalence of heat-trapping gases and black carbon in their atmosphere, the average temperature across China generally could rise by two degrees Celsius relative to pre-industrial times before 2020. The Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency is reporting for the year 2007 that about two-thirds of the increase in carbon dioxide gas emissions worldwide came from China as did almost one-quarter of the absolute amount of CO2 generated globally.

China is now the biggest producer and consumer of coal in the world, accounting for about one-quarter of worldwide coal use. Coal still powers about three-quarters of China's supply of electricity. Numerous coal fires burn uncontrolled underground. Much heat-trapping methane gas also escapes directly from coal beds and coal mines into the air without being combusted. By 2010, the previous decade is expected to have resulted in an addition of at least 600 million tonnes of carbon emissions. Even though China already accounts for nearly half of world coal production, they are still planning to expand coal output by some 30% over 2008 levels by 2015. Coal investing has been rising at 50% or more annually for several years now in China. As much as 80 gigawatts of additional coal-fired power capacity is to be added during 2009. By 2030, the world's atmosphere could be in for releases of as much as four billion metric tonnes of pure carbon equivalent from China's fossil fuel consumption alone. That amount, should it occur, would be nearly half the amount of carbon released worldwide into the air during 2007. The external health and environmental costs associated with coal mining and use are not reflected in the way-too-low administered price set for coal. This industry clearly should be progressively and aggressively carbon-taxed into oblivion. Recently, China has begun moving to stop some of the dirtiest coal enterprises from operating. Also, energy-intensive, low technology, grimy businesses of various kinds are being deep-sixed by Chinese government authorities in an overt effort to better protect the environment.

Rapid urbanization, industrialization and numerous exhaust-gushing vehicles add to China's pollution woes. About one-half million new trucks started driving on China's roads in 2007. Added to that is widespread puffing on tobacco products and cooking, especially in rural areas, using dirty biomass like dung, crop residues, wood and coal. The incidence of fluorosis remains high as a consequence of people breathing-in fluorine present in the fumes of burning coal. In China's more urban areas, haze, smoke and second hand smoke often lingers and forms a shroud over civil structures of the cities like a draping veil. Many of the world's most polluted cities have been reported for years to be in China. Breathing the air in these cities most days is equivalent to smoking perhaps two packs of cigarettes. Taiyuan, Beijing, Tangshan, Guangzhou and Hong Kong has poor air most of the time. Tianjin, one of China's largest cities and Linfen, a city in China's coal mining heartland, teeter with ecological disaster. Tianjin, Shanghai and many east coast cities also suffer from ash haze and ground level ozone pollution not to mention vulnerability to flooding. Far inland to the west, Urumqi's air quality is sometimes abysmal.

The soil across Guangdong Province generally contains very high levels of cadmium and mercury. Half the farmland in this area has too-high contamination from other metals, too including copper, nickel and arsenic. Plus there exists problematic concentrations of persistent organic pollutants. During the spring of 2009 as required by the Stockholm Convention, China has banned pesticides that contain persistent organic pollutants. So the incidence of newly-arising birth defects from this source has been eliminated overnight.

Shanxi Province is the major coal producing area of China. It also has significant metal and chemical industries. Birth defects there are running at a whopping 18% which is anomalously-high even for China. Across the country, approximately 8% of all births have defects that are at least partly-attributable to environmental degradation, in particular and especially, from the various consequences of coal use. Coarse, fine and ultrafine particulate matter, black carbon sooty gunk, carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, sulfate aerosols and ozone impinges and/or sticks to everything in China's cities including the tiny air sacs in people's lungs. For every mass-unit of coal produced in China, there are about 2.5 mass-units of wastewater generated in the process. There is further a hideous amount of coal solid waste being generated with, ecologically-speaking, no safe place to be put. Environmentally-induced illness is already widespread affecting nearly one million people a year. Many tens of millions of Chinese will become sick and succumb to lung or heart disease over the next generation from breathing the polluted air and/or inhaling smoke from burning tobacco products.

Most water across China is not drinkable. Up to one-third of the water supply is too foul to be used even for agricultural or light industrial purposes. Lately however, aggressive measures were taken to ensure drinking water for about 100 million people was safe. It is now said by officials that 90% of county towns in China will have operating sewage and wastewater treatment facilities before 2011. If it happens, that would have to rate as an Olympian-effort fix of what were monstrous environmental problems. But that still leaves perhaps 200 million others drinking questionable water or water unfit for human consumption. Further, many millions of Chinese people encounter drinking water shortages every year, as do livestock. Northern rivers, the Haihe and Liaohe, were listed as being seriously contaminated by the Ministry of Environmental Protection. In northern China now there are said to be over 4.5 million people and nearly two million farm animals experiencing severe water-stress. The numbers are apt to swell as Himalayan glaciers continue to melt as a result of global warming thus, in the medium term, threatening water levels in great river basins such as the Yangtze and Yellow River watersheds. The Yangtze, Yellow and Pearl River Deltas are very vulnerable to the implications of global warming.

Widespread overuse of nitrogen fertilizers has led to accompanying evaporation of volatile compounds contained in the chemical fertilizer thereby increasing emissions of greenhouse gases. Other consequences include acidification of soil, ground water and rainfall. Sources estimate that nearly three-quarters of fertilizer and pesticides used in China end up in the water so it is little wonder we have algal blooms in some lakes. Upwards of half a billion people depend on the Yellow River in some way yet it remains seriously polluted and water levels have already been in decline. Two-thirds or more of all waterways, surface water and groundwater are polluted. Fecal matter abounds from the epidemic of open defecation that hundreds of millions of people are still faced with doing. Diarrheal disease is commonplace as a result of exposure to contaminated water. Some government insiders say tributaries of virtually every river are effectively, ecologically dead as are the vast majority of lakes. The Bohai Sea, a dump for prodigious amounts of untreated wastewater, chemicals and fertilizer is close to being devoid of all life forms. The Yellow Sea has been stricken by algae due to high levels of nitrogen from untreated sewage, chemicals, fertilizer and other agricultural runoff. Many, if not most, maritime ecosystems are considered to be all but unsalvageable. Organophosphate and organo-phosphorous pesticide residues still show up in the food supply even though use of those pesticides is illegal.

Over the last generation, temperatures in the water and air along China's coastal areas have risen by about one degree Celsius already. Ditto for the air temperature across much of Tibet including Lhasa as the Tibetan Plateau has already endured nearly a two degree Celsius rise over half a century. Some informed sources are now saying two-thirds of China's glaciers, including from Tibetan Plateau alpine areas, will be gone by mid-century. Many grassland areas have deteriorated and been parched to the point of desertification. Soil erosion affects almost half the land area in China. This is despite the fact that net forestation rates have actually been positive overall in China. However, despite heroic tree planting and other efforts, desert areas continue to expand and now comprise over 20% of the total land in China. In addition, in many regions including on the Tibetan Plateau, vast grasslands have deteriorated into semi-arid areas due to poor farming practices, overgrazing, increased dryness and the effect of sandstorm-driven erosion. Desertification has been on the march in northern China for a long time and it encompasses many areas not just ones peripheral to the Gobi Desert. The Badain Jaran and Tengger Deserts are expanding, too. Approximately 150 million people have been disrupted, having to relocate to escape advancing parched, scorched Earth conditions. Especially in the northern regions of China, yellow dust storms are frequent due to rampant desertification. Seasonal weather systems bring air-borne polluted clouds of dust and other particles from Mongolia and Inner Mongolia. Cities such as Lanzhou are regularly blanketed in dust and sand. The dust is carried far and wide in China and easily reaches Korea and Japan, too.

China is an amazing country. But we remain very concerned that China with its very high population density and very fast, mostly-coal fired growth, are flirting with ecological catastrophe and any ensuing possibly-global chain-reaction of biophysical repercussions and social consequences. This ecological horror flick is still filming but we believe the Chinese government has been making many moves recently to seriously address environmental problems. We are quite hopeful that China will achieve their goal of becoming an "ecological civilization". People generally realize China is starting their clean, green development rush from a position quite far "up the track" but they have definitely "kicked in" to turn their troubling situation around. China is progressively increasing energy efficiency, albeit from modest levels, as outdated operators are shut down and the carbon intensity of other fuel-burning activity is gradually reduced. China may try to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by half per unit of output before 2020. That seems to be doing a lot when there's lots to do. China aims to reduce major, noxious pollutants such as sulfur dioxide and various particulates by 10% below 2005 levels before 2011. The energy intensity of aggregate output is to be curtailed by 20% during the 2006 to 2010 time interval so energy use per unit of gross product is supposed to decrease by about 4% a year. They target 20% of total energy use to come from renewable sources including about 9% from hydropower by 2020. China is already the world's fourth biggest wind power in terms of installed capacity. Inner Mongolia has huge wind energy potential. New, very high voltage, direct current transmission lines are being constructed to help bring more electric power to where it's needed. China also already has one of the largest solar power industries anywhere. We encourage the acceleration of solar, geothermal and wind power developments. Don't think 2050 with a grand plan for renewable energy deployments, think 2019, 2020 or 2030. Happily, our information is they are now aiming far beyond their original short run goals for implementing wind and solar power projects which is promising news.

China was one of the first to ban logging widely and begin massive afforestation and reforestation. China was among the first to recognize and pan cropland-based biofuels. However, now some ethanol projects are proceeding apparently. So are ones involving jatropha shrubs and other sources of second generation cellulosic biofuels. China has also been processing wheat straw into pulp for paper production for over a century thus saving woodlands. China is a leader in waste cooking oil to biodiesel and biomass utilization including for application on agricultural lands as organic fertilizer. They do not want their soil to degrade any further. They are focusing on increasing food quality and cropland productivity. Often, rural residents have their own methane biogas facilities whereby organic ends and scrap material are processed into fuel for space heating or cooking.

China was also one of the first jurisdictions to recognize the potential value of implementing quantitative taxes, tariffs, fees, fines, levies, shifts, etc to penalize polluters directly to force them into compliance, to clean up their act and to pay the full environmental costs of their acts or face being shut down. Many polluters and inefficient operators were shut down. Electronic biking was promoted heavily and there is apparently some 100 million e-bikes on the streets already, albeit mostly ones with archaic lead acid batteries. A Chinese company has mass-produced and is marketing the first plug-in hybrid car, powered in part by lithium ion batteries that are chargeable from a wall outlet. China was also first at wide-scale population control, something this planet needs now in our view. That is a lot of important firsts for China. We think Beijing Olympics was a spectacular first, too. 

We think every country recognizes by now we are all in this pollution quandary together. The five Olympic rings symbolize our interconnected continents. Just as we should also all hope and aspire to be part of, or at least bear witness to, uplifting global-in-scope celebrations together, too, like Beijing, the 29th Olympiad, we must also together face squarely possible doom and gloom situations. This means brainstorming, cooperating, organizing and helping one another with advice, knowledge, resources and technologies. We need to ensure that given the constraints our finite Earth imposes, with continuing human population growth and no other planet available currently where we can move to, we do not all end up in the toaster one day.