Ecologies & Economies
Worldwide efforts to reduce pollution and conserve natural resources were counterbalanced by the desire to stimulate economic growth. Photo reportage of man-made environmental damage illuminates the struggles that governments face trying to maintain this delicate balance. Two independent documentary projects from the United States and China illustrate how different nations contend with a similar balancing act.
Joe McNally, National Geographic Magazine
A new generation of giant telescopes will carry the eye to the edge of the universe. This twin-mirrored Large Binocular Telescope in Arizona will deliver images ten
times sharper than the Hubble Space Telescope.
Joe McNally, National Geographic Magazine
Portraits of Crab Nebula, the most famous supernova remnant, captured in visible, infrared and x-ray wavelengths, left to right, and projected on screens in Monument Valley, Utah, beneath a star-filled sky. Telescopes of the next decade will reveal our universe in unimaginable ways.
Katie Falkenberg, The Washington Times
Coal miners and wives guard the entrance to a Massey Energy mountaintop mine, shouting at protesters who had marched there to demand a stop to mountaintop removal mining. Nearly 2,000 miles of streams have been contaminated or buried and more than a million acres of forest have been destroyed across Appalachia due to mountaintop coal mining. Each week, four million pounds of explosives are used in the region for mountaintop removal, the equivalent of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Coal proponents argue that America needs mountaintop mining to keep the lights on, and West Virginia needs it for the jobs.
Katie Falkenberg, The Washington Times
Recently planted tree seedlings grow in rocky ground
designated for reclamation on a mountaintop removal site
in eastern Kentucky. Because the rich topsoil has been scraped off during mining, it's often difficult for native trees to survive on reclaimed sites. Complete reforestation is rare, and many mountaintops end up grassy pastures.
Katie Falkenberg, The Washington Times
Erica and Rully Urias of Island Creek, Kentucky, bathe
their daughter, Makayla, 5, in water containing high levels of arsenic. The family attributes the contamination primarily to the runoff from the mountaintop mines surrounding their home as well as the blasting, which they believe has disrupted the water table and cracked the casing in their well, allowing seepage of heavy metals into the water. The coal company that mines the nearby land has never admitted to causing the problem, but they supply the family with bottled water for drinking and cooking.
Lu Guang, Contact Press Images
The Tianjin Steel Plant in She County, Hebei Province, China, March 18, 2008. Pollution from the plant deeply affects the lives of local residents.
Lu Guang, Contact Press Images
A salt field worker expresses anger in Lianyungang City, Jiangsu Province, China, July 19, 2008. "I can't bear any longer the pungent smell of the gas from the chemical factories when the wind blows."
Ed Ou, Reportage by Getty Images
Mayra Zhumageldina bathes her daughter, Zhannoor, in Semey, Kazakhstan, March 2, 2009. Zhannoor, 16, was born with microcephalia, an abnormally small brain, and sixth-degree scoliosis, a twisted spine. Caused by exposure to high levels of radiation, these birth defects left Zhannoor unable to think, speak or perform basic functions. Her mother must bathe her every day because she cannot afford diapers.
Lu Guang, Contact Press Images
Wuhai City, Inner Mongolia, April 10, 2005. Workers in the factories have no immune defenses, causing them to become ill after one or two years on the job.
Adam Nadel, Freelance
Nambassa Miriyamge, Uganda. Miriyamge's three-year-old daughter died of malaria. "It was a very sad time, a bad time for the entire family," she recalls. "We are still deeply affected by her death, and I truly fear this disease." As many as 2.5 million people die from malaria each year, leaving an inescapable legacy of guilt and sorrow.
Adam Nadel, Freelance
These mosquitoes are being used to create a malaria vaccine thought to be the Holy Grail of malaria control. Mosquitoes kill more people than any other insect or animal. By transmitting malaria from human to human, mosquitoes are responsible for as many as 2.5 million deaths a year. Nearly half the world's population lives under the threat of contracting malaria. The parasite prays on the most vulnerable of society: at least 700,000 children under 5 years of age will die this year. The disease takes an economic toll, too. Malaria costs Africa an estimated 12 billion dollars annually in lost productivity.
Adam Nadel, Freelance
A boy on his way back from cutting the grass in Sa Pao,
Cambodia. The yearly monsoon rains provide much needed respite from the tropical heat and bring life-sustaining water for crops and livestock. But standing water left behind also provides a breeding ground for malaria-bearing mosquitoes. As a result, in the humid aftermath of the monsoon, infection and mortality rates increase. Paradoxically, intense rain adversely affects mosquito reproduction by disturbing the standing water enough to lower hatching rates. However, populations can increase when the rain lessens.
