Water

May 20, 2013
Hong Kong’s main source of water supply, Dongjian, was found to contain heavy metal concentration 60 percent higher than China’s water standard, Hong Kong newspaper Oriental Daily reported.
May 14, 2013
Shanghai is promoting the sale of recycled water among corporations as a way to save the resource. In one trial project, Shanghai Shenmei Beverage & Food Co Ltd, the local producer of Coca-Cola, will pump its reclaimed water from its factory in the Pudong New Area to Sharp China, which is in the same industrial park. According to the Shanghai Water Authority, Shenmei's reclaimed water was produced after purifying the water used to wash beverage bottles. It will be used to flush toilets or as cooling water for Sharp's air-conditioners.
May 13, 2013
Vietnam’s Prime Minister has approved a master plan for the building of an extensive drainage and waste water treatment system in residential areas and industrial parks in the Nhue-Day river basin, part of Red rivers system, by 2030.
May 08, 2013
Taiwan is studying the possibility of constructing underground reservoirs to help supply the country’s future water needs.
May 02, 2013
Two Singapore universities top the world in water research while a set of geographically widespread players are specialized in key subsets of the water space as water efficiency attains global priority.
An Indian reservoir
April 23, 2013
India is doubling spending on water management as part of government efforts to ease constraints on economic growth. At the moment the country treats only 20 percent of its sewage and has now turned on the financial taps as the inadequate supply of clean water is threatening to stunt growth in industrial and farm output. India has 18 percent of the world’s population and four percent of the globe’s water resources, about 80 percent of which is used for farming and less than 10 percent for all industry sectors. Water availability per person in India dropped by 15 percent in a decade to 1,545 cubic liters, according to the country’s 2011 census.
Transparency with Beijing air pollution
April 22, 2013
Following the news on environmental issues here in China can be a grim business. The first months of 2013 alone brought coverage of January’s “airpocalypse,” when air pollution in Beijing reached historic levels; news of thousands of dead pigs floating in the Huangpu River, a primary source of Shanghai’s drinking water; and a new report indicating that China sees 1.2 million premature deaths each year due to outdoor air pollution – almost 40 percent of the world’s total of such deaths. Amid such bleak headlines, it can be easy to miss any kind of progress.
Major clothing brands revealed to be responsible for water pollution
April 18, 2013
An investigation by Greenpeace International has revealed the dumping of industrial wastewater containing a cocktail of toxic chemicals and caustic water, directly into the Citarum River, West Java. International fashion brands, including Gap, Banana Republic and Old Navy are linked to this pollution through their direct business relations with PT Gistex Group; the company behind the polluting facility. In its report, Toxic Threads: Polluting Paradise, the NGO details how the PT Gistex facility has taken advantage of a system that requires little transparency about its activities and where inadequate laws are failing to prevent the release of hazardous chemicals.
April 15, 2013
Nepal, India and Bangladesh are to jointly develop and finance hydropower projects in the Ganges river basin while Bhutan, India and Bangladesh have also agreed to co-operate on maximizing hydropower potential of the Brahmaputra Basin.
April 12, 2013
In a bid to protect the country's fragile marine environment China's ocean watchdog has vowed to ban offshore projects that cause marine pollution.
April 11, 2013
China has earmarked 1 billion yuan (USD161.5 million) to ramp up the environment at the source of the country’s three biggest rivers.
HK should learn from Singapore
April 10, 2013
Singapore and Hong Kong are traditional rivals but they also share many similarities. Both are former British colonies, have limited natural resources and are economic powerhouses. Both are also dependent on others for water resources. Singapore sources about 40 percent of its water from Malaysia, while Hong Kong purchases 70-80 percent of its raw water from Guangdong. Despite this similarity, the attitudes of Singapore and Hong Kong towards water security are drastically different.  Singapore is highly pro-active in reducing its water dependency and securing its supply, while Hong Kong appears unbothered that its water security depends on an increasingly threatened source.
April 02, 2013
Following a blessing by the State Council China will move ahead with plans to build three more large-scale reservoirs on its troublesome Yellow River – the country's second-longest.
March 27, 2013
China's Ministry of Water Resources (MWR) and the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) combined to release the first official survey on the nation’s water resources yesterday, highlighting numerous areas of concern.
China water scacity
March 26, 2013
China’s top five power companies are facing a hefty bill and a potential loss of capacity in order to fit in with the country’s plan to cap total water consumption by 2030, according to a new report. The implication is that, despite plans to build hundreds of new coal-fired power plants, there is simply not enough water to accommodate them in the China’s most populated and economically developed regions. According to a new report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF), Huaneng, Datang, Huadian, Guodian, and China Power Investment are heavily exposed to water supply disruptions due to the concentration of their portfolios in moderately to severely water-scarce regions, in particular the dry and industrial northeast.
March 22, 2013
Vietnam will prioritize the sustainable conservation and management of water resources as it is an important part of the nation's 2011-2020 development strategy and the 2020 national strategy on water resources.
March 22, 2013
Beijing’s water resources can supply only 40 percent of the city's population, according to a blue book by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
March 21, 2013
China’s State Oceanic Administration (SOA) revealed on Wednesday that the country’s nearshore seawater suffers from severe pollution and water quality has actually degraded.
China water conundrum
March 19, 2013
China’s water resources are increasingly being pitted against economic development, and losing. Water is vital to all aspects of the economy, especially for agricultural and power production, making it a strategic resource. However, China’s position as the world’s factory, and its ‘develop-first clean-up later’ mindset, has resulted in much of its water resources being compromised. This is problematic as the country suffers from a lack of potable water. It has to support 20 percent of the world’s population on only 5 percent of the worlds renewable freshwater and the UN has classified China as one of 13 countries suffering from extreme water shortages.
March 18, 2013
Implementing smart meters in Mumbai, India’s most populous city, has helped cut water losses by half, according to Itron, the largest US maker of metering devices.