The southern Chinese cities of Guangzhou and Foshan were ordered Wednesday by local provincial government to soon start emergency plans to ensure safe drinking water supplies to their residents as a toxic slick approaches.
The river pollution was caused by an excessive discharge of cadmium from a state-owned smeltery in the Beijiang River, a majorsource of drinking water for cities in the northern part of south China’s Guangdong Province.
The local environmental protection departments found in the smeltery in Guangdong’s Shaoguan City that the excessive discharge of waste has made the volume of cadmium in the river section of Shaoguan surge nearly 10 times above the safety standard, “seriously affecting” the water safety in the river’s lower reaches.
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