New scientific research shows the bad air and smog from China manufacturing sites is traveling across the Pacific Ocean to the West Coast, according to report.
The findings were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Monday and is the first study to identify the pollution coming over from China as being caused by U.S. production,
The study was conducted by nine scientist from three different countries, The Post reported. The lead author is Jintai Lin from Beijing’s Peking University. The researchers claim nearly a quarter of the sulfate pollution on the West Coast can be tied to Chinese exports.
“We’ve outsourced our manufacturing and much of our pollution, but some of it is blowing back across the Pacific to haunt us,” Steve Davis, a University of California at Irvine scientist and a co-author of the study, told The Post. “Given the complaints about how Chinese pollution is corrupting other countries’ air, this paper shows that there may be plenty of blame to go around.”
Though the United States has managed to make the air cleaner by moving production factories outside the country, the polluted are from China because of that is effecting the West, the study said, according to The Post.
Due to the nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide released into the air by the Chinese factories, the city of Los Angeles deals with at least one day a year where the bad air exceeds the federal ozone standards, The Post reported.
“When you buy a product at Wal-Mart,” Davis told The Post, “it has to be manufactured somewhere. The product doesn’t contain the pollution, but creating it caused the pollution.”
China’s booming economy has created extreme environmental issues that have received criticism from all over the world, The Post reported. The researchers involved in this study hope their findings will move negotiations on clean-air treaties forward.
