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Beijing, Authorities in the city of Maoming in China's Guangdong province have launched an operation to capture more than 70 <keyword id="145156" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="crocodiles" source="Orion">crocodiles</keyword> that escaped from a commercial farm amid heavy flooding triggered by torrential rain that lashed the region, the media reported.<br /><br />At least 69 adult crocodiles and six juvenileswere on the loose near the village of Peng Cun, CNN quoted the local SHai Bao News as saying in a report on Tuesday.<br /><br />Local authorities have warned residents not to venture out, the outlet said.<br /><br />An emergency force has been deployed to locate the missing reptiles using sonar detection equipment, according to The Beijing News.<br /><br />But the depth of the floodwater is posing as an immense challenge to the operation, it added.<br /><br />A member of the emergency squad told Nanfeng Plus that they may have to euthanise the crocodiles rather than capture them.<br /><br />Photos and videos on social mediashowed some of the crocodiles lurking behind a road sign near a completely submerged road, CNN reported.<br /><br />Several crocodiles were also seen being captured and brought back to land, with their mouths and limbs tied up to restrict movement.<br /><br />In China, crocodiles are prized for their skin and the meat is believed to have medicinal value intraditional medicine.<br /><br />Guangdong is a popular location for crocodile farms due to its relatively warmer climate.<br /><br />--IANS<br /><br />ksk<br /><br />

Over 70 crocodiles escape Chinese farm after flooding; emergency force  using sonar to locate them

Beijing, Jun 23 (AP) Flooding and mudslides in southern China have killed at least three people and forced evacuations for thousands of people, official media reported Tuesday. <p>China's national observatory issued a high alert for rainstorms across vast stretches of the country for the next 24 hours. </p><p>Floods and mudslides began impacting villages and towns in the southwestern Guizhou province on Monday, state broadcaster CCTV reported. It put the number of dead at three and evacuations at more than 15,000. </p><p>To the north, about 40,000 people had to move to higher ground after waters rose in the Qijiang River in the sprawling mega-city of Chongqing. </p><p>Seasonal flooding this year has left more than 20 people dead or missing. Direct economic losses have already been estimated at more than $500 million, with the crucial tourism industry in the southern Guangxi region particularly hard hit. </p><p>Seasonal flooding regularly strikes the lower regions of China's major river systems, particularly those of the Yangtze and the Pearl to the south. Authorities have sought to mitigate the damage through the use of dams, particularly the massive Three Gorges structure on the Yangtze. </p>China's worst floods in recent years were in 1998, when more than 2,000 people died and almost 3 million homes were destroyed. (AP) NSA

3 dead, thousands evacuated in south China flooding

<ul class="summary-list"><li>The <keyword id="462030" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="green-economy">green economy</keyword> looks set to grow in the coming decade, as governments and businesses strive to address <keyword id="6366055" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="global-warming">global warming</keyword>.</li><li>At the moment, it's hard to have enough expertise to invest in the opportunity, given how complicated it is.</li><li><keyword id="107096" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Tesla">Tesla</keyword>, however, is directly involved in the green sector because it builds and sells only green technologies.</li><li>As a result, it looks like a nice, easy way to do some green investing.</li><li>And Tesla has a track record: investors who bought and held shares after the 2010 IPO have seen a 9,200% return.</li></ul><p>Investing in the green economy is tricky, mainly because environmentally-responsible investments are still fairly esoteric, to people who aren't professionals or committed to doing a lot of research.</p><p>The opportunity is set to grow over the next decade, although the rate of that development is open for debate. If Joe Biden wins the Presidential election in November and the Democrats take the Senate and hold the House, a program of global-warming-fighting legislation could be the biggest story of 2021.</p><p>Outside the US, green opportunities are also picking up. In Europe, both the giant Volkswagen Group and Mercedes-Benz parent Daimler are committing to widespread electrification of new vehicles, anticipating regulatory changes that could spell the beginning of the end for gas-burning cars and trucks.</p><p>Meanwhile, in China, most automakers expect the coming decade to bring market growth that could make the country the world's leader in electrified <keyword id="34991" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="transportation">transportation</keyword>.</p><p>If you want to invest in this changeover, however, your best bet could be Tesla. </p><h2>Tesla has a track record and has shed risk in the past year</h2><div type="image" title="Elon Musk" height="1763" width="2500" msid="78733788" hostid="261"></div><p>First, Tesla has a track record of rewarding investors. If you'd bought shares after the company's 2010 IPO, you'd be sitting on a 9,200% return today. And that's if you'd simply used your own money. If you'd bought with leverage, even at a relatively high rate of interest, the prospective amplified return is staggering.</p><p>This all happened with Tesla minting risk at a furious clip, with the stock pitching up and down like a dinghy in a hurricane, and CEO <keyword id="6355315" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="elon-musk">Elon Musk</keyword>'s Twitter habit adding to the chaos. It also happened when Tesla was operating essentially one factory, selling one or two models at a time, struggling to validate a home-solar business, and delivering fewer than 500,000 cars a year.</p><p>Over the next couple of years, Tesla should cross that 500,000 mark, have four assembly plants online (a new US factory in Texas could join the flagship in California, as well as a plant in China and one under construction in Germany). Tesla could also be operating several battery factories by then.</p><p>The valley of mega-risk has been crossed, and because the company sells nothing but green technologies, buying shares is the obvious way to invest in a global warming solution. I'm not saying you should, mind you — just that the strategy is obvious.</p><h2>Risky startups and risky traditional automakers</h2><div type="image" title="GM EV Barra" height="1333" width="2000" msid="78733796" hostid="261"></div><p>Other electric-car startups like Rivian, Nikola, and Lucid Motors are far riskier because they haven't brought vehicles to market yet. On the other hand, their shares, if and when they go public, should be cheaper.</p><p>What about established automakers with electric ambitions? </p><p>Investment professionals have been arguing for years that General Motors, now aiming to produce 22 new electrified vehicles by 2023, is horribly undervalued. But the play there is perhaps to buy GM stock with the hope that the company decides to spin off its electric business, something Wall Street has agitated for but that GM's management has been avoiding.</p><p>Tesla was starting to look pretty expensive after a huge rally at the beginning of the year took shares above $2,000. But a five-for-one stock split in August has brought shares back into reach. </p><p>Remember, the point here isn't that you're buying an electric automaker or a solar-panel manufacturer. You'd have to think hard about that, as carmakers are great at incinerating capital and, if you survey the sector, it's tough to find anything that's outperformed the markets (save Ferrari). Solar has a history of countries such as China flooding the market with cheap panels and turning the business into a low-margin commodity-like affair.</p><p>The point is that you want to invest in the emergence of a future green economy, and you want to do it without having to sort through green bond funds or socially-responsible ETFs or delving into the complexities of carbon-credit trading.</p><h2>Investing in one company and one stock rather than in an entire sector</h2><div type="image" title="TSLA Chart" height="846" width="1944" msid="78733799" hostid="261"></div><p>Tesla offers a straightforward way to do this, with enough risk still embedded in the business to make a substantial return a possibility while not weighing down the opportunity with so much risk that you'd be tempted to bail out if the stock takes a nosedive at some point in the next five years.</p><p>On the other hand, putting all your eggs in one basket carries its own risk. You clearly aren't hedging by investing in the entire sector, taking advantage of broad ingenuity and discounted prices for companies that haven't really broken cover yet.</p><p>I should point out that I've never owned a single share of Tesla. And to be honest, I'd doubt I'd buy shares of Tesla if journalistic best practices didn't bar me from doings so. I think there are better companies to invest in outside the transportation industry that have more solid revenue and profitability prospects and that aren't attractive due to big swings in their stock prices. </p><p>However, if you think the future could be greener than the past or present, and you want to wager a few bucks on your hunch, Tesla appears to be one of the best ways to invest in a single company that's representative of the developing green economy.</p>

The Tesla trade is the best way to invest in a solution to global warming

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Turenscape</span></p><p class="caption">Yanweizhou Park in Jinhua, eastern China.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong>The Chinese government is building water-absorbent projects in 30 cities as part of its "sponge city initiative."</strong></li><li><strong>To date, the cities have received more than $12 billion for sponge projects.</strong></li><li><strong>The effort faces several challenges, including China's burgeoning municipal debt crisis and its current urban planning system.</strong></li></ul><p>Like many places around the world, Chinese cities are considering ways to combat flooding in the face of climate change. Increased<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-chinas-big-plan-to-move-a-population-the-size-of-the-phillippines-from-farms-to-cities-2015-7"> urban development</a> has made flooding worse, and has turned some neighborhoods into vulnerable waterfront locations.</p><p>In 2010, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jul/21/china-flooding-worst-decade">landslides from flooding killed</a> approximately 700 people and left over 300 missing in three-quarters of China's provinces. <span>Just this July, </span><a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/07/china-floods-170704093817347.html">heavy rains pummeled southern China</a><span>, flooding towns, destroying homes, and killing at least 56 people.</span></p><p><span>In recent years, fatal floods like these have become regular occurrences. The number of Chinese cities struck by floods has </span><span><a href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2015/08/economist-explains-5" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">more than doubled</a> since 2008, according to The Economist. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/did-climate-change-contribute-to-hurricane-harvey-2017-8">Some scientists say</a> that rising global temperatures are making rainfall from storms more destructive and frequent.</span></p><p>The Chinese government is now pursuing an idea that could alleviate the problem: sponge cities.</p><p>Launched in 2015, the Sponge City Initiative invests in projects that aim to soak up floodwater. The projects are being built in 30 cities, including <span>Shanghai, Wuhan, and </span><span>Xiamen. By 2020, China hopes that 80% of its urban areas will absorb and re-use at least 70% of rainwater.</span></p><p>To date, the cities have received more than <a href="http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2017-09/26/content_32491069.htm">$12 billion</a> for sponge projects, according to China Daily. The central government funds around 15% to 20% of costs, with the remainder funded by local governments and private developers.</p><p><span>Lingang, a planned city in Shanghai's Pudong district, hopes to </span><span>become China's largest sponge city project. As CNN notes, in the past two years, the city government has spent <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/17/asia/china-sponge-cities/index.html">$119 million</a> planting greenery on rooftops, building wetlands for rainwater storage, and constructing permeable roads that store runoff. </span>In early 2016, <span>Shanghai announced the construction of 4.3 million square feet of rooftop gardens throughout the entire city.</span></p><p><span>In April, <a href="http://www.mysuezwater.com/about-us">utility company Suez</a> started installing a new 7-square-mile drainage system in Chongqing. The system's embedded sensors will allow local officials to monitor their sewer and stormwater networks to mitigate the risk of flooding, <a href="http://www.water-technology.net/news/newssuez-secures-contrat-for-sewer-and-stormwater-systems-optimisation-in-chongqing-5746392">according to</a> the company.</span></p><p><span><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Suez</span></p><p class="caption">A semi-fantastical rendering of what Chongqing, China will look like with Suez's new drainage system.</p></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p>Many of the projects incorporate green space, like wetlands and bioswales, which naturally help absorb water. The efforts seek to reduce the amount of rainwater runoff. </p><p>Though the Yanweizhou Park in Jinhua, eastern China, opened in 2014 (before the initiative began), it serves as a model for the type of flood-resilient, green infrastructure the country wants to continue building.</p><p>Featuring a series of winding pedestrian paths, it's designed to exist with floodwater during heavy rainfall. The images below show what the park looks like before and after monsoons, respectively:</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Turenscape</span></p><p class="caption">Yanweizhou Park in Jinhua, eastern China.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>The initiative is facing some challenges, according to <a href="http://www.mdpi.com/2073-4441/9/9/594">a 2017 report</a> from the <span>China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, a research institution under the country's Ministry of Water Resources. After surveying all 30 cities, the researchers noticed several roadblocks, including "ambitious goals without sound research basis," unavailable green materials, and planning models that are too homogeneous and not locally specific. China is also in the middle of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/24/business/china-downgrade-explained.html?_r=0">a growing municipal debt crisis</a>, making funding some of the projects difficult.</span></p><p><span>Still, the researchers remain optimistic, but only if cities continue to invest in research, development, and coordination among stakeholders, governments, and citizens.</span></p><p><span>"While significant challenges remain, important opportunities are opening for safer, greener, more holistic urban environments," the researchers wrote.</span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/surprising-everyday-products-made-from-cow-parts-2017-10">Only 60% of a cow is actually used for food - here's the weird stuff that happens to the other 40%</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

China is building 30 'sponge cities' that aim to soak up floodwater and prevent disaster

<p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><p>Four years after the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation <a href="https://www.cranfield.ac.uk/Research/Research-activity/Current-projects/research-projects/NanoMembrane-Toilet">awarded $710,000</a> for the development of a revolutionary waterless toilet, the technology has \&#xa0;received a second financial boost.</p><p>The Nano Membrane Toilet, as developers at Cranfield University call it, now has an additional grant that is "substantially more" than all prior funding, according to a Cranfield spokesperson, who declined to provide the exact amount. Researchers will use the money to continue developing the lab prototype and begin field trials in Africa.</p><p>Their mission is an important one: Estimates suggest <a href="http://www.one.org/international/issues/water-and-sanitation/">more than 2.4 billion people</a> around the world still live in unsanitary conditions. Without access to clean running water, these at-risk communities face life-threatening sanitation-related diseases.</p><p>The waterless and easy-to-use Nano Membrane is meant to offset this scarcity.&#xa0;</p><p>Alison Parker, a lecturer in International Water and Sanitation at Cranfield Water <keyword id="41551" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="60" keywordseo="science">Science</keyword> Institute, says her team's new design is meant to serve poor urban areas, as those will be easiest to accommodate.</p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div>"The toilet will be used in dense urban areas where a number of factors make providing good sanitation very challenging," Parker told Business Insider in March, after receiving the $710,000, "but where it would be possible to facilitate visits from a maintenance technician."<p>Since the toilet requires maintenance every six months, Parker says her team won't move into remote areas until the technology&#xa0;proves itself in cities.</p><h2><span>How the toilet works</span></h2><p><span>After a person has done their business and closed the lid, the rotating toilet bowl turns 270 degrees to deposit the waste in a vat underneath. A scraper tool then wipes off any residual waste from the bowl.</span></p><p>The solid waste stays on the bottom while the liquid rises to the top.</p><p><div></div></p><p>Extremely thin fibers, known as nanofibers, are arranged in bundles inside the chamber. They help move the water vapor that exists as part of the liquid waste into a vertical tube in the rear of the toilet.</p><p>Next, water passes through specially designed bundles that help condense the vapor into actual water, which flows down through the tube and settles in a tank at the front of the toilet.</p><p>As for the solid waste that's left behind, a battery-powered mechanism lifts the remaining matter out of the toilet and into a separate holding chamber. There it's coated in a scent-suppressing wax and left to dry out.</p><p><div></div></p><p>Every week, a local technician visits the community to remove the solid waste and water, and replace the toilet's batteries if needed. Residents can then use the water for tending to their plants, cleaning their homes, cooking, and bathing. The solid waste ends up at a thermo-processing plant to be turned into energy for the community.</p><p>According to Parker, one toilet can accommodate <a href="http://www.trust.org/item/20160107184637-2c2nk/">up to 10 people</a> for no more than $0.05 per day, per user - in line with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's original criteria for the prize. Field testing will begin later this year, Parker says.</p><p><div></div></p><p>One challenge moving forward, <a href="http://www.fastcoexist.com/3026114/take-a-seat-on-this-gates-funded-future-toilet-that-will-change-how-we-think-about-poop">which other designs have run into</a>, is scalability.</p><p>While many designs work in theory, actually getting the toilets to the countries that need them isn't easy.</p><p>Local communities have to create jobs specifically so that the toilets are safely and effectively maintained, and that training process can take time. Some scientists <a href="http://www.fastcoexist.com/3026114/take-a-seat-on-this-gates-funded-future-toilet-that-will-change-how-we-think-about-poop">have spent years</a> working on their designs, and they still aren't perfect.</p><p>Parker admits the problem of toilet paper is still one the Nano Membrane Toilet has yet to resolve, as users have no choice but to toss the paper into a nearby waste bin.</p><p>In the future, the team hopes to devise a way for that paper to be burnt. It's not the most environmentally friendly disposal method, but if it means adding years onto people's lives, it could be a winning solution.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-water-cannon-get-rid-of-smog-2016-1">This monster water cannon in China floods the air to get rid of smog</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="h2dHUyMDE69Z21wHQSYfp1Aja6fMN3Yu" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Bill Gates is backing a revolutionary waterless toilet - here's how it works

<p class="source"><span>AP Photo/Lee Jin-man</span></p><p class="caption">US Vice President Mike Pence speaks to the media at the border village of Panmunjom which has separated the two Koreas since the Korean War, South Korea, Monday, April 17, 2017.</p>Vice President Mike Pence<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ap-pence-warns-nkorea-era-of-strategic-patience-is-over-2017-4" target="_blank"> visited the demilitarized zone</a> between North and South Korea on Monday, stressing that the US's strategic patience with North Korea was over, and that the US is considering the use of military force.<p>North Korea's Vice-Foreign Minister Han Song-ryol shot back just hours later, saying if "the US is planning a military attack against us, we will react with a nuclear pre-emptive strike by our own style and method," and threatened "all-out war" in response to any US action.</p><p>On a call with reporters, the <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/us-response-to-north-korea-nuclear-test-2017-4" target="_blank">State Department told Business Insider</a> there would be a "<span>"significant international response"</span> if North Korea carried out further nuclear testing.</p><p>The exchange, while troubling, has become familiar since North Korea's nuclear and missile testing programs accelerated and President Donald Trump has taken a harder line against the Kim regime.</p><p>While experts have said with near unanimity that a US military strike on North Korea would present grave danger or an outright nuclear catastrophe, another option frequently brandished by Trump has been leveraging the US's trade relationship with China, North Korea's biggest backer, to act.</p><p>But the US may be overestimating China's pull with Kim Jong Un, according to Jenny Town, the assistant director of the US-Korea Institute and a managing editor at 38 North, a website that brings together experts on North Korea.</p><p>"China and North Korea relations have not been great to begin with," Town told Business Insider. Unlike Kim's father and predecessor, Kim Jong Un has never been to China to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Town noted.</p><p>Town said that, in the past, Beijing could have reined in North Korea. But Kim Jong Un has engaged in killing off senior officials with ties to China, thereby insulating himself. Reuters recently reported that the latest <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/r-north-korea-snubbed-chinese-diplomats-report-2017-4" target="_blank">calls from Chinese diplomats to North Korea had gone unanswered</a>.</p><p class="source"><span>AP Photo/Wong Maye-E</span></p><p class="caption">North Korean leader Kim Jong Un arrives for the official opening of the Ryomyong residential area, Thursday, April 13, 2017, in Pyongyang, North Korea.</p><p>"In China they're very frustrated," said Town. "North Korea has progressed further than what they're willing to accept" and the provocations coming out of North Korea make the relationship very difficult for the Chinese to manage. </p><p>Though White House spokesman Sean Spicer said on Monday that the burgeoning relationship between Xi and Trump has <a href="http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/politics/Sean-Spicer-Speaks-About-China-and-North-Korea-419639723.html" target="_blank">paid off</a>, Town said that the US calling for China to simply shut off the Kim regime from trade is "a naive oversimplistic view of the situation."</p><p>Town said it would be a mistake to assume that North Korea would react to China shutting off trade by crawling back to the table. North Korea could potentially find other trade partners, and even retaliate against China.</p><p>"Floods of refugees, some kinds of military coup.... the Chinese aren't ready yet to take those risks," said Town.</p><p>But while Trump tries to force China's hand against North Korea, where their leverage may be been overestimated, he refuses to give an inch on the US's end.</p><p class="source"><span>AP</span></p><p class="caption">This Sept. 2, 2014 photo shows an entrance in Sinuiju, from North Korea towards China to the "Korea China Friendship Bridge" - the old bridge connecting the two socialist states over the Yalu River. </p><p>The US lately has completely dismissed unconditional talks with North Korea, instead seeming to float military options with increasing urgency. The US currently has an aircraft carrier off North Korea's coast and has deployed additional missile defenses to South Korea.</p><p>"They need to have some level of exploratory talks," Town said of the Trump administration, noting that they could be undergoing back channel or secret talks. "Until you get to the table you don't even know what's on the table."</p><p>The testy back and forth on Monday between Pence and Han, and the decades of threats flying back and forth suggests that a new approach may be warranted.</p><p>"Going straight towards threatening military options is just adding fuel to the fire," said Towns.</p>            <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/animated-map-how-wwi-changed-europe-borders-2017-4">This animated map shows how World War I changed Europe's borders</a></h3>                                    Please enable Javascript to watch this video

The US's show of force towards North Korea may be 'just adding fuel to the fire'

<p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div>Five years after&#xa0;the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation <a href="http://www.gatesfoundation.org/What-We-Do/Global-Development/Reinvent-the-Toilet-Challenge">first challenged the world</a> to design a sustainable and inexpensive toilet, researchers from Cranfield University may have a viable contender.<p>It's known as the Nano Membrane Toilet, and it was<a href="https://www.cranfield.ac.uk/Research/Research-activity/Current-projects/research-projects/NanoMembrane-Toilet"> funded by the Gates Foundation</a> in September 2012 for $710,000.</p><p>March 22 is <a href="http://www.unwater.org/worldwaterday/about/en/">World Water Day</a>, an appropriate time to highlight the grim fact that&#xa0;<a href="http://www.one.org/international/issues/water-and-sanitation/">more than 2.4 billion people</a>&#xa0;around the world still live in unsanitary conditions.</p><p>Without access to clean running water, these at-risk communities face life-threatening sanitation-related diseases.</p><p>The Nano Membrane toilet's&#xa0;design is meant to offset this scarcity. It's waterless, easy to use, and provided it receives additional funding for field tests, could very well be part of the&#xa0;future of sanitation.</p><p>Alison Parker, a lecturer in International Water and Sanitation at Cranfield Water <keyword id="41551" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="60" keywordseo="science">Science</keyword> Institute, says her team's new design is meant to serve poor urban areas, as those will be easiest to accommodate.</p><p>"It will be very hard to carry out the scheduled maintenance" in remote areas, Parker tells Tech Insider, mostly because the toilet needs maintenance every six months at a minimum to replace certain parts. "Instead, the toilet will be used in dense urban areas where a number of factors make providing good sanitation very challenging, but where it would be possible to facilitate visits from a maintenance technician."</p><p><span>The toilet's actual design is rather complex.</span></p><p><span>After a person has done their business and closed the lid, the rotating toilet bowl turns 270 degrees to deposit the waste in a vat underneath. A scraper tool then wipes off any residual waste from the bowl.</span></p><p><div></div></p><p class="embed-spacer">The solid waste stays on the bottom while the liquid rises to the top.</p><p class="embed-spacer">Extremely thin fibers, known as nanofibers, are arranged in bundles inside the chamber. They help move the water vapor that exists as part of the liquid waste into a vertical tube in the rear of the toilet.</p><p class="embed-spacer"><div></div></p><p class="embed-spacer">Next, water passes through specially designed beads that help condense the vapor into actual water, which flows down through the tube and settles in a tank at the front of the toilet.</p><p class="embed-spacer">As for the solid waste that's left behind, a battery-powered mechanism lifts the remaining matter out of the toilet and into a separate holding chamber. There it's coated in a scent-suppressing wax and left to dry out.</p><p class="embed-spacer">Every week, a local technician visits the community to remove the solid waste and water, and replace the toilet's batteries if needed. Residents can then use the water for tending to their plants, cleaning their homes, cooking, and bathing. The solid waste ends up at a thermo-processing plant to be turned into energy for the community.</p><p class="embed-spacer">According to Parker, one toilet can accommodate <a href="http://www.trust.org/item/20160107184637-2c2nk/">up to 10 people</a> for no more than $0.05 per day, per user - in line with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's original criteria for the prize. Field testing will begin later this year, Parker says.</p><p class="embed-spacer"><div></div></p><p class="embed-spacer">One challenge moving forward, <a href="http://www.fastcoexist.com/3026114/take-a-seat-on-this-gates-funded-future-toilet-that-will-change-how-we-think-about-poop">which other designs have run into</a>, is scalability.</p><p class="embed-spacer">While many designs work in theory, actually getting the toilets to the countries that need them isn't easy.</p><p class="embed-spacer">Local communities have to create jobs specifically so that the toilets are safely and effectively maintained, and that training process can take time. Some scientists <a href="http://www.fastcoexist.com/3026114/take-a-seat-on-this-gates-funded-future-toilet-that-will-change-how-we-think-about-poop">have spent years</a> working on their designs, and they still aren't perfect.</p><p class="embed-spacer"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Parker admits the problem of toilet paper is still one the Nano Membrane Toilet has yet to resolve, as users have no choice but to toss the paper into a nearby waste bin.</span></p><p class="embed-spacer"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">In the future, the team hopes to devise a way for that paper to be burnt. It's not the most environmentally friendly disposal method, but if it means adding years onto people's lives, it could be a winning solution.</span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-water-cannon-get-rid-of-smog-2016-1">This monster water cannon in China floods the air to get rid of smog</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="h2dHUyMDE69Z21wHQSYfp1Aja6fMN3Yu" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>SpaceX/YouTube</span></p><p class="caption">Elon Musk should be getting us to Mars, not bailing out SolarCity.</p></div><p></p></div></div>In just a few months, Tesla has gone from being an upstart Silicon Valley car company on the verge of becoming a major automotive player with the introduction of it's $30,000, mass-market Model 3 and its 373,000 pre-orders to being a budding conglomerate that's about to acquire a struggling solar-panel leasing company to the tune of $2.6 billion.</p><p>The SolarCity deal, set to be voted on by shareholders next month, will also entail the absorption of $2.5 billion in debt, weighing down Tesla's balance sheet at exactly the wrong time.</p><p>Make no mistake, this is a SolarCity bailout, and the deal is complicated by the fact that Tesla CEO Elon Musk is the largest shareholder of both companies - and that Musk's cousin is SolarCity's CEO. Since the beginning of the year, SolarCity shares have plummeted by more than 50%, and the solar-panel leasing-and-installing has over a billion in debt payments due by the end of 2016.</p><h2>The Master Plan</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_left"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Google Finance</span></p><p class="caption">Ouch.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>For Musk, SolarCity is a critical piece of his Master Plan to accelerate humanity's departure from the fossil-fuels era, debt be damned.</p><p>Tesla vehicles produce no carbon emissions, although much of the electricity that powers them comes from burning coal. Solar is the fix on that front: clean energy drawn from Musk's favorite source, that giant fusion reactor in the sky, the Sun. </p><p>As an aside to this discussion, Musk's third company, SpaceX, will provide the escape hatch if everything goes horribly wrong: we'll use Mars colonies to "back up the biosphere," as he puts it, and SpaceX rockets will get us there.</p><p>It all fits together beautifully, and in fact <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/musk-give-up-tesla-ceo-job-2016-9">I think Musk should step down as Tesla CEO</a> so that he can devote himself entirely to SpaceX.</p><p>But unfortunately, if the car industry is tough and getting people to Mars currently insurmountable, then the solar business is really just terrible. Yes, it has been improving steadily for a decade, and SolarCity's leasing model is innovative.</p><p>However, the industry repels technical innovation - controversial and failed Solyndra had a breakthrough technology that was completely overwhelmed by the commodity nature of solar-panel manufacturing when China flooded the market in 2011, sending Solyndra into bankruptcy. And customers need to sign on to an abstract, environment-saving agenda that may not have much impact on their household bottom lines for years.</p><p>Now Musk wants to yoke electric cars, solar power, energy storage, and possibly ride sharing into one big Tesla party, all while keeping SpaceX on pace to send humans to Mars in a decade.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Thomson Reuters</span></p><p class="caption">Stop before it's too late.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><h2>Tesla and SpaceX win while SolarCity loses</h2><p>As someone who often looks at the Sun and looks at his roof and considers the energy cost-savings possibilities, I'm naturally sympathetic with Musk's ambitions. But where Tesla and SpaceX are concerned, now isn't the time for the art of the possible. SolarCity is going to be a huge drag on Tesla ability to push electric vehicles past a tipping point: if Tesla can hit Musk's targets, it will be selling more EVs every year by 2018 than are currently on US roads in total.</p><p>SolarCity has clearly become a capital-destroying machine. It's market cap is worth less than its debt, and Tesla is paying a half a billion premium to assume those liabilities. Even the most swashbuckling private-equity buccaneer would conclude this deal looks pretty lousy.</p><p>It's also one of the largest deals being done right now by an automaker. General Motors and Ford have been buying companies. But they haven't come anywhere near what Tesla will be coughing up for the right to inhale SolarCity. Their acquisitions also seem strategic - GM buying Cruise Automation for self-driving tech, while Ford bought Chariot, a Bay Area bus service that's a big buyer of Ford vans. They aren't fooling around with purchasing oil exploration or gas-refining operations.</p><p>Of course, it's Musk's job to think far, far ahead, and we should commend him for it. There's not more visionary figure in American business at the moment - and there may never have been, in US history. But that doesn't mean he's incapable of presiding over a merger that could do horrible damage to Tesla, setting the automaker back years and putting and end to its impressive run.</p><p>I don't know if Tesla can call off the SolarCity deal before it's too late. But if it can, it should.  </p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/kid-car-enthusiast-uk-reviews-tesla-model-s-2016-9">A 13-year-old kid explains why Tesla is the best car</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="FxeGF1NTE6G-Fu2c2rgCh9j1kvA6VXES" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Tesla should bail out on the SolarCity merger before it's too late

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Reuters</span></p></div><p></p></div></div>The consensus on Wall Street is that looking at China's gross domestic product to understand its growth rate doesn't work.</p><p>That's because investors have noticed that no matter what happens, the government's projections on the first day of the year always seem to come true.</p><p>Exports can tank (as they did in July), the property market can slow (as it has all year), manufacturing output can look dismal (also a recent theme), but no matter what, the government insists the country is still growing at 7% GDP.</p><p>So what do China investors look at to figure out how the country is doing?</p><p>Jim Chanos, founder of the short hedge fund Kynikos Associates, has been bearish on China for years. At a China Institute discussion in New York City, he explained what he looked at while investing.</p><p>"China is still a debt-driven, some say addicted, society," he told the crowd.</p><p>In other words, Chanos believes this is a story about an explosion in credit.</p><p>So he and his associates look at China's banking system for direction. They look at loan growth, capital adequacy, and credit expansion and/or contraction.</p><p><span>By his estimation, in 2001 China's GDP was roughly $1 trillion. Bank loans were also $1 trillion, with $400 million of those loans nonperforming.</span></p><p>Now China is an $11 trillion economy with $30 trillion in loans with 1% to 2% of those loans nonperforming, he said. Dangerous stuff.</p><p>Loan growth is continuing, even during this time of economic duress. The percentage of nonperforming loans has been growing as a result.</p><p>If you are looking at what he is looking at, it is ugly.</p><h2>Track it</h2><p>Back in 2011, China came up with a data point to wrap up a lot of what Chanos looks at. It's called <a href="http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-11-13/news/sns-rt-china-tsf-factboxl3e8m24an-20121112_1_central-bank-yuan-loans-interest-rates">total social financing</a> (TSF). The measure is supposed to calculate the fundraising going on all over the country, including banks and corporations.</p><p><span>China's central bank describes it as "a money-added concept, indicating total funds </span><span>the real economy obtained from the financial system over a </span><span>certain period of time."</span></p><p><span>Chanos describes it as "<span>the most underappreciated number in global finance."</span></span></p><p><span><span>It includes Chinese bank loans in yuan, foreign-currency loans, bank-acceptance bills, corporate bonds and non-financial-institution equity sales. It's basically the debt everyone is racking up including, ideally, what's going on in the world of shadow banking.</span></span></p><p><span><span>Here's what that looks like:</span></span></p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"><p class="source"><span>Morgan Stanley</span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>In June and July, total social financing expanded faster than Wall Street analysts expected. Part of that was due to the government's coming to the rescue of the stock market. New loans surged, almost hitting the level they were at when China flooded the economy with cash during the 2009 financial crisis.</p><p><span><span>In August, new loan issuance slowed as the stock market rescue came to an end, but TSF still grew to<span> 1.08 trillion </span><span>yuan</span><span> </span><span>($169 billion) for the month from 718.8 billion </span><span>yuan</span><span> </span><span>in July.</span></span></span></p><p><span><span><span>Depending how you look at it, this is good (because it keeps money flowing through the economy during a slowdown) or bad (because it's adding debt to the economy during a slowdown).</span></span></span></p><p><span><span><span>Take your pick.</span></span></span></p><h2><span><span><span>How this gets ugly</span></span></span></h2><p>China's "new normal" plan to move the economy from one based on investment to one based on domestic consumption has not been going as planned. The economy is slowing down faster than anyone expected.</p><p>Part of that is because of debt. State-owned enterprises are so busy paying it back and keeping people employed that they're not focusing on productivity. This is how you get zombie companies.</p><p>So part of the new-normal plan is to restructure these companies, but the government didn't want to do that through loans because there was already so much debt on the books. That's why it encouraged Chinese people to get into the stock market - so companies could be capitalized during their transition.</p><p>Of course, that didn't work. The stock market crashed in both June and August.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"><p class="source"><span>Investing</span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>So China will have to find another way. One that most likely means more debt issuance and more easing to keep money flowing through the economy. We've already seen some of that, as China's central bank, the People's Bank of China, has cut rates four times this year already.</p><p>The question, though, is whether these loans will be productive. An economic slowdown doesn't help - it means people will have trouble paying back loans. Banks are already starting to feel that.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"><p class="source"><span>Macquerie</span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Plus, as Societe Generale analyst Wei Yao points out, Augusts' TSF data doesn't really give you the whole picture of how much debt is being taken on, because it didn't include a bond swap with local governments to the tune of 415 billion yuan (around $65 billion).</p><p>That swap still didn't spur productive economic growth. August was an ugly month for data across the board.</p><p><span><span>"The unpleasant implication is that even the most effective growth stabilizer of loan-backed infrastructure stimulus has not yet gained enough traction," Yao said in a recent note. "The only solution is to do more infrastructure investment, which we expect."</span></span></p><p>These infrastructure projects could be productive. China, however, has a history of building things it doesn't need.</p><p><span>"They'll put a smoke belching factory in the middle of a city," Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein said in an interview last week. "In China, when they want to pump up their economy ... they build 82 airports."</span></p><p>Of course, he added, 30 of those airports would be in the wrong place.</p><p>And that means the country is just adding to its massive pile of debt with loans that may never be paid back.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/chinas-financial-building-project-collapsed-2015-7">Everything collapsed at a government-funded construction site in China - a worker captured it on camera</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="picWNmdjrXgYGUnQw188GD2AhOREKMew" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

This is what Jim Chanos looks at when he's looking at China

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Jonathan Drake/Reuters</span></p></div><p></p></div></div>President-elect Donald Trump ran the table in longtime-Democratic states like <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/how-hillary-clinton-lost-election-to-trump-2016-11">Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan</a>, as well as swing states like Ohio and Florida, on his way to a seemingly improbable electoral victory earlier this month.</p><p>Chris Arnade, <a href="https://twitter.com/Chris_arnade/status/798358092241059841">an independent journalist </a>who has spent the last four years traveling the country to document the opioid crisis, was <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/election-day-could-trump-win-clinton-2016-11" target="_blank">one of the few who wasn't</a> surprised. After traveling tens of thousands of miles in working class communities along the "Rust Belt" and elsewhere, he found one constant.</p><p>"Wherever I saw strong addiction and strong drug use, I saw [support for] Trump," Arnade told Business Insider. </p><p>And new voting data has suggested a correlation between communities hurt by drugs and Trump support. Since the election, Shannon Monnat, a rural sociologist and demographer at the Pennsylvania State University, has dug into the results. She found that counties that voted more heavily for Trump than expected were closely correlated with counties with high drug, alcohol, and suicide-mortality rates.</p><p>Two other factors were strongly correlated with Trump "over-performance," Monnat found: the percentage of white voters in the county and its ranking on Monnat's "economic distress index." Monnat's distress index, which she has used in her research for years, combines the percentage of people in poverty, unemployed, disabled, in single-parent families, living on public assistance, or living without health insurance.</p><p>Monnat wasn't surprised by the correlation.</p><p><span>"I expected to see it because when you think about the underlying factors that lead to overdose or suicide, it's depression, despair, distress, and anxiety. That was the message that Trump was appealing to," Monnat told Business Insider. </span></p><p><span>"People are literally dying," she added. "There was such a sense of hopelessness that it makes sense they would vote for massive change."</span></p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://twitter.com/smonnat/status/798694594963763200">Courtesy of Shannon Monnat</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div>That correlation surfaced across the country, not just in areas of heavy Trump support like Appalachia and the Rust Belt, said Monnat. Even in counties with high drug, alcohol, and suicide-mortality rates that Trump lost, he overperformed relative to 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney.</p><p><a href="http://kathleenjfrydl.com/">Historian </a><span><a href="http://kathleenjfrydl.com/">Kathleen Frydl</a>, who has closely followed the opioid crisis, noticed a similar phenomenon unfolding on election night. Traditionally blue counties that she knew to be hard hit by opioids were flipping to Trump. </span></p><p><span>After "recovering from the shock," she began comparing the drug overdose death rate with voter performance in critical states such as Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan.</span></p><p><span>What she found was striking. </span></p><p><span>Six of the nine Ohio counties that flipped from Democrat to Republican in 2016 <span>logged overdose death rates far above the national rate of <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6450a3.htm">14.7 people per 100,000</a>. Nearly every Ohio county with an overdose death rate above 20 per 100,000 saw voting gains of 10% or more for Trump compared to Romney, and/or drops of 10% or more for Hillary Clinton compared to President Barack Obama in 2012. Only two -<span> Butler County, home to Miami University, and Hamilton County, the jurisdiction for Cincinnati - did not conform to this pattern.</span></span></span></p><p>Meanwhile, 29 of 33 Pennsylvania counties with overdose death rates above 20 per 100,000 either conformed to the same pattern or flipped from Democrat to Republican entirely. (You can see Frydl's <a href="https://medium.com/@kfrydl/the-oxy-electorate-3fa62765f837#.2pjw6l8tg">comparison of county vote totals and overdose death rates here»</a>)</p><p>The phenomenon led Frydl to dub such voters "<a href="https://medium.com/@kfrydl/the-oxy-electorate-3fa62765f837#.9uhtmqnrg">the Oxy Electorate</a>." </p><h2>'A sea of correlations'</h2><p>The Economist noted similar voting trends, though it <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21710265-local-health-outcomes-predict-trumpward-swings-illness-indicator?fsrc=scn/tw_ec/illness_as_indicator">argued that combining life expectancy and public-health metrics</a>, such as obesity, heavy drinking, and physical activity, was the most accurate predictor of Trump's overperformance of Romney.<span></span></p><p>However, even in the Ohio counties that The Economist pointed to as evidence of its analysis - Knox and Jefferson - the overdose death statistics bear out. Jefferson County, whose margin of victory for Trump was 30% higher than Romney's compared to 14% for Knox, according to The Economist, had an overdose rate in 2015 of <a href="http://www.healthy.ohio.gov/-/media/HealthyOhio/ASSETS/Files/injury-prevention/2015-Overdose-Data/2015-Ohio-Drug-Overdose-Data-Report-FINAL.pdf?la=enhttp://samquinones.com/reporters-blog/2016/11/21/donald-trump-opiates-america/">28.8 per 100,000</a>. Knox's was nearly half that, at 15.1 per 100,000.</p><p><span>Renowned statistician and FiveThirtyEight editor in chief </span>Nate Silver argued on Twitter that education levels were still the most accurate predictor of Trump voting trends and that linking heroin deaths with voting was a "<a href="https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/801082266533249024">spurious correlation</a>." Many analysts have pointed to percentage of non-college educated white males as the leading predictor of Trump performance.</p><p>Frydl said, however, that there is "sea of correlations" uniting these communities across the country, noting overdose deaths rates, mortality rates, education levels, and race, among others. And while she said "correlation does not equal causation," the characteristics can help analysts understand why Trump's campaign had such appeal.</p><p>Similarly, Monnat suggested that the rates of <span>drug, alcohol, and suicide-driven mortality </span>she looked into are not in and of themselves enough to explain why voters gravitated towards Trump. Rather, she said, they are "reflective of the structural problem."</p><p>These are communities that feel "marginalized" and "left behind" by globalization and the larger economic structure that has taken place over the last several decades, Monnat said. These are communities that have lost <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2016/03/29/news/economy/us-manufacturing-jobs/">high-paying manufacturing</a> and <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/20/world/americas/alienated-and-angry-coal-miners-see-donald-trump-as-their-only-choice.html?_r=0">mining jobs</a>, have seen their downtowns gutted for Walmarts and big-box stores, and have seen <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/28/business/economy/recovery-has-created-far-more-low-wage-jobs-than-better-paid-ones.html">low-wage service jobs fill in the employment gap</a>.</p><p>In these communities, it's not just about an economy that's failing them, Arnade said, but how the very structure of their communities have changed, for both rich and poor. Social networks have become "broken" and people feel "humiliated," he said. </p><h2>'America does not seem great'</h2><h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Robert Galbraith</span></p><p class="caption">A car is parked outside of the "Hard Times Tavern" in Fort Gay, West Virginia May 19, 2014.</p></div><p></p></div></div></h2><p><span>The coming of the opioid crisis in the "Rust Belt" and Appalachia felt a lot like the economic problems that preceded it - something over which its residents had no control. </span></p><p><span>People "</span><span>were unprepared for [the opioid crisis] and, what's more, believed they had done nothing to deserve it," <a href="http://samquinones.com/reporters-blog/2016/11/21/donald-trump-opiates-america/">investigative journalist Sam Quinones</a> wrote on his blog Monday. Quinones investigated the causes of the opioid crisis extensively in his 2015 book, </span><span>"</span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Dreamland-True-Americas-Opiate-Epidemic/dp/1620402505?tag=bisafetynet-20">Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic</a>.</p><p>"<span>The effects of opioid addiction ripple out far beyond addicts to affect entire communities, Quinones wrote, killing their "buoyancy of spirit" and leaving them open to the "foreboding that seemed to motivate many voters."</span></p><p>In an interview with the Columbia Journalism Review, Arnade <a href="http://www.cjr.org/covering_the_election/chris_arnade_trump_supporters_america.php">described the prototypical "white working class</a>" community that he visited: Prestonsburg, Kentucky, a coal town of 3,500, mostly white residents. Here's how he described its turn towards Trump:</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;"><span>"There's a real strong sense of community, but the entire community is feeling humiliated. The whole town feels like it's suffering, and with the economic decline has come a large increase in the things that follow: addiction, breakup of families. The place feels very hurt."</span></p><p style="padding-left: 30px;"><span>"And in comes Trump with a message of restoring pride - partly through white identity - that resonates there, because from Prestonsburg, Kentucky, America does not seem great."</span></p><p>Trump's attack on immigration and globalization was the perfect "one-two punch" in a place like Prestonsburg, Arnade said. It "punches downward" by scapegoating others, like immigrants and minorities, and upward at what the working class views as a "rigged system" pushed by politicians with "fancy educations."</p><p>But Arnade said its too easy to vilify such voters as "racist and stupid," even if Trump's racial appeals may have resonated. Many Trump voters in those communities, he said, voted for Obama and were voting "to kick over the system."</p><h2>'A social policy failure'</h2><h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>WCPO/Screenshot</span></p></div><p></p></div></div></h2><p>Frydl described the movement from economic decline to opioid crisis to Trump support as "a nested chain of causality," wherein the anchor is the loss of industry and economy in the "Rust Belt" and Appalachia.</p><p>Frydl too saw the Trump win in such areas as a vote against the status quo in the same way that a vote for Obama was in 2008. In that way, she thinks Trump's upset is a "de-facto" judgment on Obama's failure to be the "change agent" many thought they were voting for.</p><p>"The people in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and the steel belt that voted for Trump were aware that the steel mills closed in 1983. They were aware of that in 2012 when they voted for Obama. There is something specific to the opioid crisis in the last four years that is a social policy failure that deserves to be treated as discrete," she said.</p><p>Frydl, who has written <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Drug-Wars-America-1940-1973/dp/110769700X">a history of the drug war in America</a>, believes that the Obama administration's response to the opioid crisis signaled to many addiction-ravaged areas that "their suffering was not registering with the Democratic Party establishment."</p><p>The administration's landmark <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ap-obama-signs-compromise-drug-abuse-bill-into-law-2016-7">bipartisan bill passed earlier this year to address the crisis</a>, the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act, was seen as modest, at best. Attorney General Eric Holder failed to hold Purdue Pharma, widely considered to be the main source for opioid overprescribing in the 1990s and 2000s, or other pharmaceutical companies to account for their part in the crisis, Frydl said. And even as the government cracked down on legal prescription drugs, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/man-with-alleged-ties-to-the-sinaloa-cartel-arrested-in-ohio-2015-11">heroin from Mexico</a> and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/heroin-overdoses-ohio-indiana-kentucky-west-virginia-2016-8">synthetic opioids from China</a> flooded in to meet demand.</p><p>After decades of systemic economic decline and the government's failure to address the subsequent public-health crisis, Trump's outsider campaign was perfectly primed to capitalize on "the Oxy electorate's" fears about foreign influence and loss of status.</p><p><span>"I'm not sure why we didn't think it would impact the presidential election," Monnat said. "It's finally come to bear, and we're going to have to deal with the repercussions of that."</span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ivanka-trump-distancing-ad-donald-election-campaign-politics-boycott-fashion-2016-11">Here's the ad that Ivanka Trump reportedly doesn't want America to see</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="9rdTZmNzE6g_Oanxz-p79XPRsrT1PEcQ" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

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