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Meltdown In Tibet: China's Reckless Destruction Of Ecosystems From The Highlands Of Tibet To The Deltas Of Asia

Tibetans have experienced waves of genocide since the 1950s. Now they are facing ecocide. The Himalayan snowcaps are in meltdown mode, due to climate change―accelerated by a rain of black soot from massive burning of coal and other fuels in both China and India. The mighty rivers of Tibet are being dammed by Chinese engineering consortiums to feed the mainland's thirst for power, and the land is being relentlessly mined in search of minerals to feed China's industrial complex. On the drawing board are plans for a massive engineering project to divert water from Eastern Tibet to water-starved Northern China. Ruthless Chinese repression leaves Tibetans powerless to stop the reckless destruction of their sacred land, but they are not the only victims of this campaign: the nations downstream from Tibet rely heavily on rivers sourced in Tibet for water supply, and for rich silt used in agriculture. This destruction of the region's environment has been happening with little scrutiny until now. In Meltdown in Tibet, Michael Buckley turns the spotlight on the darkest side of China's emergence as a global super power.

Hardcover: 256 pages

Publisher: St. Martin's Press (November 11, 2014)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 1137279540

ISBN-13: 978-1137279545

Product Dimensions: 6.3 x 1 x 9.5 inches

Shipping Weight: 14.7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)

Best Sellers Rank: #971,433 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #261 in Books > Engineering & Transportation > Engineering > Civil & Environmental > Environmental > Pollution #901 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > Public Affairs & Policy > Environmental Policy #2468 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > International & World Politics > Asian

Michael Buckley, a Canadian, wrote the first Lonely Planet guidebook to Tibet. An adventure travel writer, film maker and environmentalist, he is much travelled in Tibet and Himalayas, where he has gone white water rafting down the mountains. He first visited Tibet in 1985 as a truck passenger and saw the constant stream of treetrunks being hauled as China felled Tibetan forests, ongoing since China took over Tibet in 1950.This book lays bare the continuous plundering of the Tibetan plateau and mountains by Chinese settlers and soldiers. By 1980 a fact-finding mission from Tibet's former rulers found that the grasslands, once-rich in natural diversity, were empty of wildlife - all eaten, Buckley believes.The Himalayan snow and glacier ice is the world's largest store of freshwater outside the Polar regions. Yet this ice which should reflect heat back into space, is sooty and black in many areas, from Chinese and Indian coal emissions and cooking stoves. Dark ice attracts heat so melts faster, and dark rock is exposed in a feedback loop. 95% of glaciers are shrinking faster than they can be replenished. As these glaciers feed some of the world's largest rivers which flow through eight populous countries, problems are foreseeable. These include lack of crop irrigation and drinking water.Added is the fact that China is constructing massive dams, fourteen just on one river and more on others, to completely control the flow. They are diverting major Indian rivers northwards for their own use. Buckley found it hard to get information as Tibet is a black hole, people tending to vanish and no net service available. But Google Earth shows massive mines, tunnels and dams.

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