Thousands of miles separate China's water-rich south and the nation's coal-rich north. In northwest China where water resources are particularly scarce, including the provinces of Inner Mongolia, Ningxia and Shaanxi, the coal industry is rapidly expanding. Last year Greenpeace issued a warning that this coal expansion poses a serious threat to the precious water there and thus the crops and farming communities that depend on it. This year our field investigation dug up evidence of exactly that.
Greenpeace