Large riverbed dust storms have always been a thing. Absolutely and for sure. Taiwan gets some of the strongest rains in the world, temporarily, and we are extremely mountainous. This creates waterways that cannot regrow vegetation and they literally are the pipes that relieve the water pressure of our mainland. This is all very true, well studied and fully accepted. By everyone.
The difference now is 2 fold.
- Before, we hadn’t dug massive waterways to avoid flooding. This is good for people in many ways but also makes the main arteries more concentrated. we used to have massive spead out wetlands and jungles in the flat lands. Not anymore, it is all mitigated. For decades.
- In times long ago there were no mining operations, outpouring the inner earth in more extreme ways. landslides and all the natural toxic shit to trickle down is now extrapolated due to this.
2.A. In the past we didn’t have large amounts of indindustrial, commercial and residential toxic waste going durectly down pipes and fed directly into the rivers. This is going into said normal dust storm river beds and getting kicked up by the winds.
What does that mean? What is thought to be water pollution and contamination, which is beyond rampant here in this country, is now becoming air borne because it drains into ditches, channels then rivers. Things settle in between rocks and such (check any riverbed). Once it gets dry, this “mud”, that is fully contaminated with who knows what, gets kicked up in wind storms. We are not just breathing in chemicals from industry/agriculture/household but also literally breathing in shit. The ppm this day, or the next, might seem low, but calculate 50 years of 24/7 and then contemplate it.
What I was trying to demonstrate with those pics is particles in the air and the reality of gravity. Light weight vs heavy. Those pics are VERY heavy weight, yet still that high up. Your cars are covered in that dust too. Now a days we also need to pay particular attention to not only the quantity of such particulates, but their actual makeup. Very important points. No one wants to admit it, because everyone is complicit. Just a fact. A hard one. But, a real one.
Lung cancer and “alergies”, as an example, are common here. It shouldn’t be a mystery why. Sure the Gobi. China, japan and etc. We can’t control them. But we can control ourselves, domestically. We haven’t. We don’t. I doubt we will anytime soon. Enjoy the air quality, we are all complicit. And, sure, the government should absolutely step up…but. Haha. This is Taiwan. Industry rules. Laziness reigns. Fact of life.
Before we discuss how to solve this, we should at least all understand the actual facts and what is happening. After that, we can just start to discuss possible solutions.
Never about cleaning up pollution and infrastructure 