A Chinese official called the Three Gorges Dam a "failure," saying that the project had failed to consider its impact on the environment and has contributed to lower water levels in bodies downstream. While parts of central and southern China are suffering from severe droughts as water levels continue to fall across the country and fish stocks dwindle, a devastating drought in the north and the pollution of the Yellow River--so thick that the river can no longer serve as a drinking supply--has threatened the nation's farmland.

A senior official in China demanded last week that foreign embassies stop releasing air pollution data after a U.S.-run Twitter feed directly contradicted official Chinese readings over several months. Many residents of smog-coated cities dismiss official readings of "slight" pollution, and since the state tightened monitoring standards in January, the embassy's measured air pollution level is often at odds with China's own data. Though China did not specifically mention the U.S.

China's state council will likely hold a meeting before the end of June to approve plans for the nuclear industry, according to Xu Yuming, the vice secretary general of the China Nuclear Energy Association. The nation is currently building at least 27 reactors and has 50 more planned, according to the China Nuclear Energy Association.

The United States, Japan, and the European Union (EU) have challenged China's export restrictions on rare earth materials, requesting dispute settlement consultations from the World Trade Organization (WTO). In the first WTO case filed jointly by the parties, they argue that China is driving up the prices of rare earth, crucial to the development of renewable energy technologies, by limiting exports.

Officials and activists detected toxins in consumer products in unrelated incidents in Beijing last week. The state's Xinhua News Agency said that police had arrested nine people and detained 54 others over chromium detected in gel capsules manufactured with industrial waste. According to Xinhua, police had seized 77 million capsules and halted 80 production lines as of last week, and no one has become ill or died from the capsules. The police also said they had arrested a local official who ordered his brother's factory torched last week to avoid the crackdown.

China's Three Gorges Dam Corp. began preparations last week on a dam that will flood the last free-flowing portion of the middle section of the Yangtze, the nation's longest river. The dam, which will turn the middle of the Yangtze into a series of reservoirs, will leave "no space for fish," said environmentalist Ma Jun, as the dam will flood a nature reserve meant to protect about 40 species of river fish."This is the last one, the last section in 2,000 kilometers along the Yangtze that was left for endangered or local fish species," said Ma.

The movement of direct action campaigns for the environment in China, whose mantra of "public participation" was popular just a few years ago when Premier Wen Jiabao personally blocked plans to dam China's last free flowing river, may be on the decline as activists face an increasingly hostile political climate, according to an article in Yale's online environment journal.

China is likely to cap energy consumption as part of a low-carbon plan to be issued later this year, and experts believe that officials have agreed on its level. However, the cap, which would make it easier for trading schemes to succeed and help the country reduce emissions, may be less tough than expected. According to Reuters, officials seem to have settled on a 4.1 billion ton coal equivalent total energy cap, which is 25 percent higher than scholars involved in the discussion proposed last year.

Myanmar's pro-democracy opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi last week called for a halt to construction of China's hydropower project on the Irrawaddy, an important river threatened by logging, pollution, and the construction of at least seven dams. Suu Kyi warned that the project would destroy the environment along the 1,300 mile river, flooding the rainforest with a reservoir the size of New York and displacing 10,000 people.

A march of 12,000 demonstrators against a chemical plant in the port city of Dalian caused China to shut down a plant that generates 2 billion yuan in local taxes every year. Calls to relocate the plant, which was called a "time bomb" by one protestor, mounted after a tropical storm caused a wave to breach a dike built to protect the plant from floodwaters. The plant produces paraxylene, a highly toxic chemical used in fabric manufacturing, and residents expressed concern that future flooding may cause a spill.