Award winning photographer Lu Guang (卢广) from People’s Republic of China is skilled at social documentary photography, his insightful, creative and artistic work often focused on “social phenomena and people living at the bottom of society”.

Incredible images of how serious things can turn after a simple lack of consideration for our earth.

Lu Guang:

“China has many problems, but that isn’t to say you will be able to see them and take pictures of what is real. My photography isn’t just simple photography, it’s more of an investigation. You need to be calm and slow to do a detailed investigation. You should go to villages, to talk to ten, twenty or a greater number of villagers; only then will you be closer to a deeper level of truth.”

Quote from chinadialogue

1. Near the border of Ningxia province and Inner Mongolia province. The earth has become an industrial waste dump giving off an unbearable foul smell. Golden fumes pollute the air and industrial sewage pollutes the Yellow River…”

2. Industrial chemical waste from Jiangsu area dumped on the bank of the Yangtze River.

3. Fan Jai Zhuang in Anyang City, Henan province villagers live right next to a belching smelter that pollutes the whole village and surroundings.

4. This endless stream of Industrial sewage in Zhejiang Xiaoshan flows into the Qiantang River.

5. From the Henan Anyang iron and steel plant the industrial sewage flows into the Anyang River.

6. In Guangdong province a villager in Guiyu is washing in a seriously polluted pond.

7. In Shizuishan Industrial district in Ningxia province people have to protect themselves from the smoke and dust whenever going outside.

8. The Yellow Sea coastline, where countless sewage pipes spew filth onto the beach, into the shallows and further out in the deeper ocean.

9. Filthy pollution in Ma’anshan, Anhui province in the Yangtze River.

10. In Inner Mongolia they call these polluting columns of filth from the Lasengmiao Power Plant “two black dragons.”

11. In Jiangsu province Changshu City Fluorine Chemical industry land sewage treatment plant sends raw sewage 1500 meters out into the Yangtze River.

12. Soil pollution from Anhui Province Ma’anshan Chemical Industrial District by Yangtze River.

13. Every day Industrial wastewater flows into the Yellow River from Inner Mongolia Lasengmiao Industrial District.

14. Chemical wastewater discharging into the Yangtze River from Zhenjiang Titanium mill, less than 1,000 meters upstream of Danyang City’s watersupply.

15. Haimen city, Jiangsu province, chemical laden wastewater discharging into the Yangtze River.

16. Hebei Province Shexian Tianjin Iron and steel plant pollutes the area in every way imaginable.

17. Badly polluted Longmen town in Hanchen city, Shaanxi Province due to large-scale industrial development.

18. Five ‘temporary sewage pools’ that hold some of the worst comtaminated wastewater from the over 100 chemical plants in Jiangsu province coastal industry district, discharge into the ocean on highest tides twice monthly.

19. Jiangxi Province Hu Ko County, a chemical factory illegally landfills the Yangtze River bank to expand the scale of the factory.

20. An underground pipe carries chemical wastewater from Anhui Province Cihu Chemical Industry District to the Yangtze River. The color varies from black, gray, dark red, or yellow, depending on the factory discharging at the time of observation.

21. Shanxi Province has the highest rate of birth defects and is worst polluted. This loving farmer couple adopted 17 disabled children.

22. The Yellow River smells badly, it’s more than this shepherd can bear.

23. 15-year-old boy from Tianshui, Gansu Province followed his parents to Heilonggui Industrial District. He earns 16 yuan a day.

24. Couple arrive home from work at the plaster kiln in the Inner Mongolian province of Heilonggui.

25. Kang village in Linfen City, Shanxi Province where drinking the polluted water contaminated by industrial waste 50 people got cancer and cerebral thrombosis. 64-year-old Wang Baosheng has festering sores all over his body so he can only lie face down on the edge of the bed.

26. Within 1–2 years of working, breathing in large amount of dust every day people get sick.

27. Zhangqiao village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan Province Sun Xiaojun, a woman aged 45, cannot not move her feet or hands for the past 4 years.

28. Waiting for death in Zhaozhuang village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan province is 66-year-old Zhao Bingkun.

29. Gao Wanshun from Zhaozhuang village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan province lives in poverty, his wife died of cancer.

30. Coal ash fills the air in Linfen City in Shanxi province outside workers suffer the most.

31. “when the wind blowing towards our side, the foul smell from the chemical factories is unbearable. There is even more poison gas at night.” Salt factory worker in Lianyungang, Jiangsu province.

32. People form Fanjiazhuang prepare a complaint filled with their fingerprints, to seek compensation for pollution damage.

33. In Shanxi Province charitable nursing homes help disabled infants abandoned by their parents.

34. Liujiawan village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan province. Villages helped pay for 13 year old Yang Xiao’s medical treatment. When the grandmother saw the old village chief came to visit his granddaughter, she kneeled on the ground holding granddaughter’s hand.

35. The oldest is 9, not going to school, the youngest is less than 2 years old. Their hands and faces are always dirty. They lived in severely polluted area.

36. Mazhuang village by the Hong River in Wugang City, Henan province, stomach cancer victim, 58-year-old Ma Haipeng cannot work and must take medicine every day to relieve his pain.

37. Every year, a lot of babies in Shanxi Province are abandoned. Kong Zhenlan in Qi town who makes a living by recycling trash adopted 25 abandoned children.

38. Cancer Village – Xuanwei in Yunnan province. Every year more than 20 people die of cancer. 11-year-old student Xu Li suffers from bone cancer.

39. In Shexian Village, Hebei Province, cancer patients number more than 50 and more than 20 die from cancer each year.

40. 4-year-old girl and her grandfather visit her mother’s tomb in Zhangyuzhuan village by the Hong River in Xiping county, Henan province. Her mother Zhu Xiaoyan died from stomach cancer aged 22.

original source: Fengniao