Opinion: Shipping coal to China pollutes air in B.C.

16/04/14
Author: 
Calvin Sandborn, Kyle McNeill and Rosie Jacobs
Citizens in front of Port Metro Vancouver offices at Canada Place

Some would call it poetic justice. If we increase thermal coal exports to China, we will not only poison the citizens of Beijing and Shanghai, we will likely contaminate our own air.

Prevailing winds across the Pacific connect us directly with China’s unfolding environmental catastrophe. Indeed, disturbing new studies have found that on some days, up to 25 per cent of Vancouver’s air pollution already comes from China, largely from coal-burning plants.