Regional

China: The electronic wastebasket of the world

Author: 

Ivan Watson
Where your used electronics go in China
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Did you ever wonder what happens to your old laptop or cellphone when you throw it away?

Chances are some of your old electronic junk will end up in China.

According to a recent United Nations report, "China now appears to be the largest e-waste dumping site in the world."

E-waste, or electronic waste, consists of everything from scrapped TVs, refrigerators and air conditioners to that old desktop computer that may be collecting dust in your closet.

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The Great Green Wall of Africa

Author: 

Kyle Benjamin Schneps
A dried up river filled with sand winds its way across the desert near Gos Beida in eastern Chad June 5, 2008. (Finbarr O'Reilly/Courtesy Reuters).
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In February 2011, an international summit in Bonn, Germany officially approved the building of a pan-African Great Green Wall (GGW) in support of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD). The GGW initiative plans to strategically plant swaths of trees roughly nine miles wide and over four thousand miles long.

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Samso

Source: 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/gdsdigital/6044866075/

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Samsø is an energy self-sufficient island off the coast of Denmark. See what they are doing to be sustainable.

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Zambia-Zimbabwe dam on verge of collapsing: report

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China.org.cn
The wall of Kariba Dam, one of the world's largest dams measuring 128 meters tall and 579 meters long, has developed weaknesses and may collapse if nothing is done to repair it in the next three years, the report said.
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A hydroelectric dam bordering Zambia and Zimbabwe threatens the lives of 3.5 million people in the southern African region as it is on the verge of collapsing, local newspaper Zambia Daily Mail reported Tuesday.

The wall of Kariba Dam, one of the world's largest dams measuring 128 meters tall and 579 meters long, has developed weaknesses and may collapse if nothing is done to repair it in the next three years, the report said.

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4 percent of Chinese cities report clean air

Author: 

Zhu Ningzhu
Forty-eight percent of days last year in Beijing had clean air, while 16 percent of days suffered heavy air pollution.
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BEIJING, March 25 (Xinhua) -- Only three out of the 74 Chinese cities that were monitored for air quality last year reported clean air, while the large majority suffered various degrees of pollution, the Ministry of Environmental Protection said on Tuesday.

The three cities to meet government-set air quality standards are Haikou, capital of south China's Hainan Province, Zhoushan in east China's Zhejiang Province, and Lhasa, capital of southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region.

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Construction Begins on $7 Billion Power Africa Project

Author: 

Tam Harbert
Nighttime Near Nairobi: Only 18 percent of Kenyan house-holds have access to electricity.
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This spring, construction is set to begin on the first projects coordinated through Power Africa, a multibillion-dollar Obama administration initiative that seeks to double access to electricity in sub-Saharan Africa within five years, and in some cases accelerate reforms in the governments of the nations involved. Among the initial projects are wind farms in Kenya and Tanzania, and a solar project in Tanzania.

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Climate action needs to be part of city planning - urban leaders

Author: 

Samuel Mintz
People visit the beach on New Year's Day in Durban, South Africa, on January 1, 2014.
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LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – From Durban, South Africa, to West Chester, Pennsylvania, local and municipal governments are trying to do their part to slow the advance of global climate change and adapt their communities to new climate realities, as laid out in the latest IPCC report by scientists this week.

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