Brownfield and Redevelopment in China Research Paper

Brownfield and Redevelopment in China - Research Paper Example Environmental Protection Agency). It is further defined as† a parcel of land contaminated by one or more hazardous substances, but has potential to be reused once it is cleaned up† (China Development Gateway, 14 January 2011) . In the past several years, hundreds of polluting enterprises have been relocated away from city centers in Beijing, Shenyang, Guangzhou and other large Chinese cities. As a result, a large number of abandoned industrial brownfield sites can potentially be "recycled" for contemporary urban use, appropriate to the safe levels achieved after the clean-up. These could be anywhere from abandoned factories or manufacturing plants, factories or gas stations where substances were once used. The Brownfield become an obstacle for city expansion. Aside from this, Brownfield causes environmental risks due to possible pollutants that may still be present, yet redevelopment of these sites will contribute to urban development, create jobs, and develops green spac es and working land. Seeing the importance of these properties for development, China had to ask the World Bank for assistance in developing a sustainable program of development for these areas. As an insight, the history of the problem will be presented, the types of hazardous elements and contaminants found in abandoned areas will be categorized, the actions taken by the government is shown, and the recommended solutions formulated by World Bank is presented. Brownfields started in the Great Leap Forward era of 1950s wherein many of the state-owned factories were constructed within the city perimeter. (Zhang Xian, January 22. 2011) Reports said that these factories used antiquated equipments and had improper management and inadequate environmental services. As such, there was much pollution in the area, and in some instances pollution was 100 times higher than regulations permit. Report said that some underground organic pollutants have developed into non-aqueous phase liquids, wh ich, if not dissolved in water, can be a source of new pollutants. It is also feared that contaminants can transfer in the underground water, thus leading to a widespread distribution of poison. Four types of contaminants were found in the Industrial brownfield areas, and these are: Heavy contaminated sites. These come from steel, iron and smelting plants, ore tailings . Heavy metal contaminated sites. Typical contaminants are arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury, and chrome. Persistent Organic Pollutant (POP) contaminated sites. China produces, and widely uses, pesticides such as DDT, HCB, Chlordane and Mirex. Although certain pesticides haven’t been used for many years, some remain in the soil. New pesticide-contaminated sites continue to be discovered in China, in addition to other types of POP contaminated sites, such as PCB capacitor dismantling and burial sites. Organic contaminated sites such as petrochemical, coking etc. Substances include organic solvents, benzene and hyd rocarbons, often mixed with other contaminants such as heavy metals. Electronic waste sites. Incorrect disposal of electronic waste can affect human health. The main contaminants are heavy metals and POPs (bromination flame retardants and dioxin). Source: Xie, Jian and Li Fasheng, 2011 In the past, there was little attention given to Brownfield areas and its harmful effects because of

CIS Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

CIS - Essay Example These features are what connect people as social beings. It is through real conversation that one can express their real emotions and people can be able to express their deep concern. It is a sad state that this new technologies are converting people into asocial beings. Teenagers subscribe to unlimited texts and are always on the phone even when having real conversation with people around them. It is not possible to concentrate on one’s phone and at the same time maintain eye contact with the person one is conversing with. This passes as a rude kind of behavior making the other person feel less appreciated and has ruined our relationship with people around us (Turkle 2013). It is thus possible to stay connected with other people through texts, tweets, FaceBook but at the same time be alienated from people around us. It follows that during conversation, no one really listens to the other causing a disconnection. What is even more scaring is the fact that people do not even get time to be alone. We are always bombarded by emails, text or even tweets during working hours, during our free time and even at night. The exchange of information never stops. This then implies that people never really get time to reflect on their own life and meditate. It has become even more difficult for people to create their own identity as our actions are shaped by these electronic means of communication (Turkle 2013). It is feared that in the end, we will have a world full of people with identical behavior and way of thinking and this blocks creativity and development in general. From this talk, it can be seen that in the near future, people will not be able to make simple personal real life conversation and this will have unimaginable consequences on our social structure. Staying connected has had its advantages in ensuring immediacy of information which has promoted businesses and other operation. Life has become very fast. This situation is scaring and measures need to