tell your doctor if you've been to areas... ...where certain fungal infections are common and if you've had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flulike symptoms or sores. don't start humira if you have an infection. talk to your doctor and visit humira.com this is humira at work. on this side of the world, we're waking up to the news that the state department officially notified the u.n. just hours ago that the u.s. is formally leaving the paris agreement. formally because under the terms of of the agreement, the u.s. can't depart until november 4th, 2020, the day after the next elections. so this is really just another chance to tell the president's supporters in the coal belt, the ones he addressed yesterday at a rally in west virginia, that he's delivering on his campaign promise. but it's far more important than that. this is about the direction our country is heading in. there are a couple of things that are important to know about

the paris agreement that may have been lost in all the rhetoric. one is that the agreement is nonbinding. the other is that until now, only two countries refused to sign it. nicaragua and syria. the u.s. has just formally joined that distinctly unexclusive club. congratulations. the top ranking american diplomat here in china quit his job two months ago. he simply couldn't understand or defend the decision to quit paris. we have an exclusive interview with him later in the show. some americans believe that global warming is a hoax. we're not going to spend a second of this show discussing whether climate change is man made or cyclical or caused by alien spacecraft, because frankly, it doesn't matter. a new world is coming. no matter what you believe, new economies, new businesses. a world of electric cars and cheap, reliable solar energy. china is, to be sure, a super

polluting and super polluted place, that burns more coal than any other country. largely because of that, the air in beijing is basically not fit for humans to breathe. but in the past few years, both china and india have figured out that renewable energy is actually good business too. both countries have enormous and very poor populations. and yet both plan to not only meet the goals set out in the paris agreement, but beat them. we're about to take you on a journey through asia to see why china and india are racing ahead to embrace new technologies, and making a killing in the process. surprisingly, our journey to asia begins, of all places, in brooklyn. >> here come the red lights. here they come for race two in the qualcomm city e3. already drivers are mixing it up. >> breakdown on the inside. >> this is what speed sounds like now.

welcome to formula e racing. all the adrenaline, all the excitement, with very little noise and zero emissions. and if you've never heard of electric car racing, you probably also haven't heard of anand mahindra, whose team came in second and third in this recent race in brooklyn. ♪ >> but in india, mahindra is a household name. in a country known for poverty, spirituality, and some of the most congested streets on earth, he's a billionaire who drives a tiny, cheap, all electric car called the e20. >> sustainability is an opportunity to innovative dramatically. if you look at leaps of innovation, they've come around a single movement of innovation.

>> the e20 is the only electric car made in india. this woman couldn't wait for her father to sign the papers and for the whole family to climb in. they think it was cramped or basic or slow. they thought it was the future. so does mahindra. >> india has suffered not simply from poverty of income or wealth. happily, under this current regime, that is being rectified. so you'll see a lot of very ambitious goals being set. >> starting with the goal of replacing every single vehicle on india's roads with an electric by the year 2030. india's prime minister is big on moonshot goals. in 2015, he traveled to california to visit the tesla factory and meet the world's most famous electric car pitchman, elon musk, who is planning to open a factory in india.

mahindra welcomes the competition. he recently said on twitter, "time you got out here, elon, you don't want to leave the whole market to mahindra, do you?" >> he made electric cars sexy. he made them desirable. he made them aspirational. that is what we need. this should not be seen as cars for geeky tree huggers anymore. they should be mainstream. he helped do that. we have to acknowledge that. >> mahindra's cars, on the other hand, are not designed to be sexy. he's competing on price and scale. the cheapest tesla, the model 3, can travel three times the distance the e20 can cover on a single charge. and it costs twice as much. mahindra believes the prices will drop fast.

>> the prices are plummeting. it's currently two-thirds of the value of an electric car. we expect them to go down to a third very soon. so the tipping point between gasoline and electric cars is going to be reached sooner than people think. >> the race to make batteries that last longer and cost less is on. musk is focusing on quality, while choice manufacturers are focusing on quantity and price. mahindra is happy to watch this race play out. >> now, when these elephants clash, it's actually very good for us. the old adage was, you don't want to get in the way of elephants clashing. we love seeing elephants clash, particularly when they relate to the supply of batteries to this industry. >> to see the impact that chinese industry can have on an energy market, we traveled, of all places, to rural india. people here still use hand tools and primitive sources of energy.

but just over the horizon, the future is already here. india produces about 8% of hits power from renewables like wind and solar. it's about the same percentage as the united states. but india has set as a national priority the goal of nearly tripling that number in just five years. these solar panels are the fruits of american investment. seven years ago, an indian entren entrepreneur pitched goldman sachs. they gave him money to get his power company started. now it's worth $2 billion. >> we have facilities across different parts of rural india, 60 plants like this. >> he went to columbia business school in new york. he says president trump's basic assumption that good old coal is a better, cheaper source of energy than solar is out of date. >> renewable energy is becoming much cheaper than polluting sources.

maybe three years ago or five years ago it might have been the correct statement to make, which is that cheaper sources of energy are more polluting. but today that is no longer the case. >> new technology is here. >> exactly. you have solar and wind now that is far cheaper than any coal-based source of power. >> he's no ecowarrior. he and his investors were initially drawn in by subsidies offered by the government. the idea was, if you subsidize it, they will come. and this field of mirrors is proof that it worked. now, market forces are doing the rest. >> the most important thing that has happened is that the panels themselves have become cheaper. they've come down to a third of what they cost just three years ago. >> with each generation of solar panels getting better and cheaper, creating a cycle in which demand and supply are both growing rapidly. we decided to next head to the engine that powers that cycle. china. this is the factory where the panels we saw in india are

produced. the speed with which factories like this one have popped up is astonishing. >> china now is the largest builder of wind farms and solar farms around the world, by far. they're building at least twice as fast as the united states. they've really taken over the world in terms of solar capacity and solar manufacturing. you know, 66% or so of the solar panels that are sold around the world now are from china or taiwan. >> alvin lin is with the natural resource defense council. he says that china, which is one of the most polluting and polluted nations on earth, changed course a decade ago and is now racing to become a green powerhouse. is it because they tried the other experience, choked on the bad air, and decided they can't do that anymore? or is it a business opportunity, or both? >> it's both. it's both. you know, china has always been using a lot of coal because it has a lot of coal.

but back in 2006, they passed the renewable energy law. so that for the first time really set out these targets, this plan to support the development of wind and solar. >> china spent $102 billion on renewable energy in 2015. that's more than twice what the u.s. spent. and while president trump talks about bringing back jobs in coal, china plans to spend even more on renewable energies over the next three years, and create 13 million jobs in the process. >> you look for the trends, jump ahead, take the leadership. that's how you create jobs. that's all china's doing, right? i don't know what the hell we're doing. >> chris deangelis is an american lawyer who works with large technology companies in beijing. he says while americans argue about the science of climate change, the chinese are racing ahead. >> whether or not you believe it, this is where the world is going, right? you take a very sort of business focus on it.

they see where this is going. the whole world is going down this path, other than the u.s. right now, right? and it's an opportunity for them to lead. it's an opportunity to generate jobs. so they're killing it right now. >> and it doesn't stop at solar panels. remember that race to build better and cheaper batteries to power electronic cars? chinese factories like this one are ramping up production so quickly that they will be making enough batteries here to power 1.5 million tesla cars a year. for all of musk's energy and innovation, he can't compete with china on his own. >> china's environmental policies are way ahead of the u.s. their mandate for renewable energy far exceeds the u.s. sometimes people are under the impression that china is either dragging their feet or somehow behind the u.s. in terms of sustainable energy promotion. but they're by far the most aggressive on earth.

>> everyone says technology, technology, be creative, be an innovator, okay? the fact is in many ways china almost uses technology as a commodity now. they're like, we can buy it, we have tons of people, we can make it. >> and not only in china. when the city of los angeles decided to switch its bus fleet to all electric, a new factory quickly opened up in the mohave desert. it's backed by warren buffett but owned by a chinese company. the first buses are already on the road in lancaster, california. another win for the chinese way of doing renewables. back in his office in beijing, deangelis says american companies were inherently the underdogs in this race. >> we do have amazing pockets of technology all over the u.s. but it's everybody on their own, versus china, which is the entire country that's like on the same mission. >> deangelis has lived in china for the past 13 years.

he has seen how quickly this an generate country is changing its ways. what he can't understand is why our president can't do the same. >> all he does is talk about, he's going to get coal jobs. it's an old world he's fighting for. it doesn't matter if you like it or not. the future is moving on. the u.s. needs to accept that, right? >> is the u.s. going to miss the next industrial revolution here? >> the u.s. is still leading the world across almost every technology from a pure technology perspective. the question really is, does that matter. >> critics would say, ah, we've heard all this before, the chinese were going to be eating our lunch, didn't happen. why is now any different? >> because now is, what you're starting to see, i think, the result of 30, 40 years of planning of an entirnation aligned on one goal, that again, it's not like they're saying, oh, in the next five years. they've been planning this for years. their education system, their supply channels, everything. it's moving up through the

system. >> and they were waiting for this opportunity? >> yeah. i mean, this is, you know, a 100-year plan, right? >> was trump a gift to china? >> i think so. i would be pretty happy if i was china. >> there was at least one person here in beijing who was not happy when the president dropped out of the paris agreement. he was that senior american diplomat we told you about. and he told me that forced to choose between his career and a policy he could not accept, his faith led him to the answer. >> i'm a christian. i'm not a theologian. if we're stewards of creation, charged with taking care of this earth, that means doing things to make that happen. >> that story, still to come. but first, the president singled out one american city in his speech, saying he was elected to represent pittsburgh, not paris. turns out not everyone in pittsburgh was happy about that. we'll have that story coming up next. it's time to rethink what's possible.

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welcome back to beijing. this moment like now feels like a tipping point. all over the world, governments and businesses are realizing that what's good for the environment has finally become good for the bottom line too. many american businesses agree. but our government does not. why is our president so committed to bringing back coal? i have to say, i don't know. but he sure is. the location for president trump's latest rally was hardly a surprise.

west virginia. the man joining him onstage, the state's democratic governor and a billionaire coal magnate who announced to a pumped-up crowd he was switching parties and becoming a republican. >> today i'll tell you as west virginians, i can't help you anymore being a democrat governor. >> trump won west virginia by 42 points in november. it was a state where he visited early and often, where his crowds were among the most enthusiastic, and a place where everyone knows coal is king. >> i like hardhats. let's see if it's a hardhat. it's a hardhat. it was coal country that was also the subject of one of

hillary clinton's biggest campaign gaffes. >> we're going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business. and we're going to make it clear that they don't want to forget those people. >> remarks like that don't play well in coal country. despite low approval ratings nationwide, the president remains hugely popular in big coal-producing states like west virginia, wyoming, and kentucky. and despite the fact that there are now twice as many solar jobs as coal jobs in the u.s., it doesn't seem like this president is interested in moving on anytime soon. i'm not hearing ifb. will you cue me? one american city has become the symbol of the struggle between coal and renewables, between the glory of the past and the promise of the future. we asked nbc news's chief environmental correspondent anne thompson to pay that city a visit. >> reporter: an all-american city trying to move beyond its past. today's pittsburgh gleaming on three rivers. the city president trump highlighted to justify withdrawing from the paris climate agreement. >> i was elected to represent the citizens of pittsburgh, not paris. >> reporter: a shoutout

pittsburgh's mayor took as a cheap shot. >> he's representing an old image stereotype of pittsburgh, an old image stereotype of a city that we're very, very proud of, that's part of our heritage, but is also part of our past. >> reporter: he should know. the mayor was born here, in the shadow of the steel mills and the coal mines that powered them. >> both of my grandfathers worked in the mills. my grandfather died at the age of 50 at the jones and lockland mill. >> reporter: is president trump being nostalgic or unrealistic? >> if the president wants to see an example of how a city that was knocked out, left for dead, was told that its days are gone, can come back and be able to retake its position on a global stage, all he has to do is come to pittsburgh. >> reporter: they discovered coal in pittsburgh before the country was born. >> steel has kept pace with and anticipated the increasing needs of the nation.

>> reporter: it fueled the steel industry that gave pittsburgh its nickname. this was steel city, until the domestic industry collapsed in the late 1970s. >> we went through 30 years of a depression. our unemployment in the city was hovering at 19%. >> reporter: that's the pittsburgh peduto wants to leave behind. the city he runs now would seem like science fiction then. >> so we've got these guys too. >> what is this? >> robot cars. >> why are you testing in pittsburgh? >> because pittsburgh is such a difficult city to drive in. they call at it black diamond of driving. >> that's only one of five driving experiments going on in pittsburgh. we embraced green technology. we embraced the things the paris agreement called for as a part of our economic growth strategy. >> reporter: there is another part of the city's future. it lies beneath rolling farmland

an hour away, where the state's first new coal mine opened in three years with the president's backing. >> coal is no longer a four-letter word in this country. because of that, that has a big impact on investor relations, lender relations, hiring. >> does pulling out of the paris agreement help or hurt your industry? >> there's the perception issue. >> reporter: the coal here will be used to make steel -- somewhere else. most of it going overseas. today, with automation, mining, like so much else, isn't as labor-intensive as it once was. >> 75 to 100 jobs really is a drop in the bucket when you consider there have been tens of thousands of coal mining jobs lost here. >> we think it's the start of something larger. these miners are typically heads of household, very much family-sustaining incomes.

>> reporter: a ripple effect felt at the nearby coal miners' cafe. >> it's not 70 to 100 jobs. it's 70 to 100 families that can do something. they can go out to eat, they can go out to movies and do what they want to do. >> reporter: pittsburgh's mayor says the president's vision is blind to reality. >> i think he's giving a false promise to those who desperately need hope. >> reporter: what's the problem with trying to revive that industry? >> that the industry has already passed. >> reporter: in its heyday of steel production, people used to describe pittsburgh as hell with the lid off. on his phone, peduto shows me pictures of pittsburgh at 12:00 noon. >> it's pitch dark. >> pitch dark. the lights were on 24 hours a day in downtown pittsburgh because the amount the pollution took away from the ability to see. >> reporter: it cleared up when homeowners switched from coal to natural gas. today utility companies are doing the same, switching to cleaner natural gas, wind, and

solar instead of coal. >> economics is the piledriver that is pushing down the coal industry. >> reporter: eric shaffer used to work for the environmental protection agency. now he leads the nonpartisan watchdog group the environmental integrity project. >> can the current white house return the coal industry to its glory days? >> i don't think so. i don't think you can bring coal back with campaign promises. and i don't think killing environmental rules that protect our air and water is going to save work in the coal industry at all. >> reporter: since the president took office, coal mining has added 800 jobs. and there's an uptick in production. and at the new mine, there is a sense of optimism in the air. >> we're very proud of what we're doing here. and it would be great if the country could see that. >> reporter: in pittsburgh,

mayor peduto sees the mine as just a temporary fix. like the steel mills his grandfathers worked in, a symbol of the past. not a road to the future. >> so if coal is not pittsburgh's future, what is? >> there's nothing progressive about telling a coal minor they don't have a job. so we want to be able to work with them to be able to help them to see how our economy is now booming in technology, in medicine, in renewable energies, and be able to say, there's a future for you too. >> reporter: pittsburgh electing to stay in the paris agreement, to build a greener, more prosperous city. >> sometimes distance gives us perspective. beijing is a long way from pittsburgh. here the debate about coal is basically over. people here have moved on. so has the technology. next up, the most senior american diplomat in china was expected to defend a policy he thought was just wrong. so he decided he wouldn't. >> you serve until you can no longer can serve. you have to get up in the morning ready to resign that day. when you have allergies,

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welcome back to beijing. it's saturday morning here. and people are playing traditional songs in this park. two months ago, the most senior american diplomat here resigned from his post. he told staff at the embassy that he couldn't represent the climate policies of the trump administration. when i met him, the first thing i asked him was whether his decision was political. some people watching this might think, oh, here's just some

liberal who couldn't stomach the fact that trump got elected president, didn't want to work for the guy and then decided, i'm quitting. >> i have been shot at. i missed the birth of my first child and the senior year of my son. i made a lot of sacrifices for the career i believe in, not for a political point of view but because i think it's the right thing for the country, for the american people. >> david rank is back home after 27 years of service all over the world. the soft-spoken diplomat and his wife mary have raised a family while quietly promoting the policies of five administrations. >> a strawberry pie with some blueberries in it, on account of patriotism. >> when president trump announced he was dropping out of the u.s. paris agreement, he got on the phone.

>> my wife was back in the united states. we had a quick exchange. i said, hon, i don't think i can do this, i don't think i can continue. my wife has been incredibly supportive through a long career. she was supportive then. made my decision early saturday morning. and then talked to the staff on the following monday. >> what did you say? >> i had a serious principled disagreement with the administration. given where i am and the level i'm at, i could not continue in the job. >> you told them, i'm leaving, but you don't all have to leave. >> that's right. >> you weren't trying to take everybody out the door with you. >> that's right. because i think that would be terrible for the american people. >> nicholas burns who served as undersecretary of state under george bush said, about your case, "it's an extraordinary situation for the foreign service. they pride themselves on being nonpartisan. they serve each president 150%." do you think you fell short of that standard? >> no, actually i feel like that's the model of public

service, is you serve until you can no longer serve. you have to get up in the morning, particularly at senior levels, ready to resign that day. if you cannot balance your conscience and your obligation, your duty to serve, then i think that is the ultimate of service. >> rank published an opinion piece in "the washington post" in which he said when the administration decided to withdraw from the paris agreement on climate change, as a parent, patriot, and christian, i could not in good conscious be involved in any way, no matter how small, with the implementation of that decision. as a patriot, christian -- and -- >> and a parent. >> and a parent. >> as a patriot, i've worked for 30 years to advance american interests. i think pulling out of paris is fundamentally against our interests. as a parent, i have three kids. as a parent, one of the things you aspire to do is leave the world, leave them in a little better shape than you found the world. and then finally, as a christian, i'm not a theologian, but if we are stewards of creation, if we're charged with

taking care of this earth, that means doing things to make that happen. and if there is a better instrument for that to address climate change than the paris agreement, i haven't heard about it. >> the president called the paris agreement, and i quote, an agreement that disadvantages the united states to advantage other countries, leaving taxpayers to absorb the cost in terms of shuttered factories and vastly diminished economic production. he's basically saying people like you value the environment more than american workers. >> i mean, the u.s. has made remarkable strides in reducing emissions over the last 20 years. that has not been at the expense of jobs. the idea that there's a contradiction between more climate-friendly policies and the economy, i think just the

basic facts don't bear that out. >> a career in the state department is not all about speeches and conferences. rank had some hardship postings, including a two-year-long tour at the embassy in afghanistan, which came under heavy fire twice during his time there. now he's trying to readjust to a live on a quiet street in virginia. what's it like to be back in suburban america? >> you know, i've always loved the united states of america. so it's great to be back. >> you're still just kind of catching up, reintegrating with your country? >> who do i talk to, if you have a job, let me know. >> are you looking for a job? >> i've got to figure out what i'm going to do with myself, yes. >> rank and the state department are diplomatic about his departure. >> anything to say about the rather abrupt resignation of mr. rank in beijing? >> his decision was a personal decision.

and if you allill give me the grace as i go through my book here, we know that he spoke to staff ere. give me a second. we appreciate his years of dedicated service to the state ment. and for anything more on that i have to refer you to mr. rank. >> are you angry that your career, after nearly 30 years, ended the way it did? >> oh, no. not at all. i remember, i was thinking on the way out, what i felt was just a sense of gratitude. gratitude to the people i worked with, gratitude to the american people who trusted me to represent them for a long time. i didn't expect it to end that way, but to leave on my own terms, it's a real privilege. no, i'm just very grateful. >> of course it's important to note that this administration hasn't just pulled out of one international agreement. across the board, there's a clear push to reduce environmental protections. the newly-appointed head of the epa has a history of arguing that the agency should be

eliminated. funding for research in this area has been targeted for cuts. the list goes on. coming up later in the show, what a difference a little power can make in a small village in cambodia. stay with us. (vo) more "doing chores for mom" per roll more "doing chores for dad" per roll

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♪ >> back in the summer of 1988, ronald reagan decided the time had come to tackle climate change once and for all. the problem, is he saw it, was having to listen to scientists insist that the globe was warming. the international panel on climate change came into existence to consider whether humanity was responsible for climate change, if so, by how much, and how much could be done about it. those scientists would hammer out a report and countries would be given recommendations to follow. while the white house hoped it would be tied up for years, it

didn't count on the process actually working, which it did two years later when the group issued its first comprehensive report. it clearly linked global warming to human activity. that report paved the way for 25 years of negotiations, culminating in the paris agreement. those reports were overwhelming support in the international scientific community. the problem is only scientists understand the science. there have been five issued since 1990 and each one is thousands of pages long. to make life simple, each comes with a short summary to make science easy to grasp. governments get to chip in on the summaries. and surprise, surprise, that's where things start getting political. so to keep everyone happy, it was decided that these agreements would be completely nonbinding. that means there is absolutely no penalty if a country fails to meet its climate target. which is why for almost 30 years now, republicans and democrats have taken turns to stand up a pledge to act and then haven't.

>> the united states is strongly committed to the ipcc process of international cooperation on global climate change. >> i am very pleased that the united states has reached a truly historic agreement with other nations of the world to take unprecedented steps. >> my administration has taken a rational, balanced approach to these serious challenges. we believe we need to protect our environment. >> even president obama, who came into office promising to lead the way, came up short. he arrived at the copenhagen climate summit in 2009 amid huge expectations. but the deal fell apart. >> i don't know how you have an international agreement where we all are not sharing information and ensuring that we are meeting our commitments. that doesn't make sense. it would be a hollow victory. >> the fact was president obama did not have congressional support and everybody in copenhagen knew it.

in paris six years later, the president tried a radical new approach. he used an old semantic trick to take congress right out of the decisionmaking. during a state visit to china, the president said all the differences with beijing had been ironed out. >> this is a major milestone in the u.s./china relationship. and it shows what's possible when we work together on an urgent global challenge. >> reporter: so this time around, somehow a nonbinding agreement was not a hollow victory. these twists of logic demonstrate why other signatories are fed up with washington. after the drama of the obama years, the next president just yanks the country back out again. but here's where president trump may have seriously miscalculated. had he stayed in, washington would have been able to veto any meaningful change it didn't want. but by leaving, in an effort to deny barack obama a legacy, he's

freed up the rest of the world to establish a set of rules without any input from the u.s. of course in terms of credibility, it doesn't help when a new president comes in and tears up an agreement made by the previous administration. would you take america at its word if you were negotiating with us? next up, a story about a miracle in a monastery in cambodia. the miracle of light. stay with us. kage was making me feel like i couldn't spend time with my grandson. now depend fit-flex has their fastest absorbing material inside, so it keeps me dry and protected. go to depend.com - get a coupon and try them for yourself.

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welcome back to beijing. we've heard a lot of big numbers in today's show. lots of billions with a "b." but the fact is the price of alternative energy technology is dropping. and that's having a profound effect on the lives of some of asia's poorest people. we asked nbc news' janice mackey frayer to go meet them. >> reporter: a few years ago, something happened here that changed their way of life for the better. that something was electricity. powered by a solar panel on the roof. we had to light many lamps before, says the head monk who oversaw the installation. "now we can study late into the night."

in cambodia, only 56% of the population lives in places that are connected to the power grid. in remote parts of the country, the only way to get electricity was, until recently, one of these. but generators are hard to maintain and expensive to run. now there's a much cheaper option available -- a solar panel, typically made in china, costs about $400 to set up. that's a lot of money for this woman and her family, but they recently installed one on their one-room house. now she has light to cook by every night, and her days no longer need to end when the sun goes down.

it has changed my life, she says. i can do whatever i want, whenever i want. her husband does construction work. he tells me he doesn't make much, but says the panel was worth every penny. across southeast asia, more than 120 million people still don't have electricity. solar energy has the potential to transform lives here. we traveled to thailand, another country which has struggled to meet rising demand. but rural areas like this -- and they're all over the region -- are waking up to the possibilities of renewables. what their government can't provide them with, solar panels can. like in this village where people have built themselves a mini electricity grid that runs on solar power.

it helps farmers irrigate their fields and grow the local economy. they've been empowered, so to speak, by the man who runs workshops on solar energy so the villagers can learn how to install and maintain their systems. self-taught, he started sharing his skills about 15 years ago. his approach is so successful, he now teaches 60 communities a year. the thai government has limited resources, he says. they try to help as much as they can, but the community needs to meet them halfway. once installed, these panels will give homes enough power to run a small television and some light bulbs for the very first time. it doesn't sound like much, but

consider this. southeast asia has one of the fastest growing populations in the world. demand for electricity is climbing, and bigger solar projects are already under construction. renewable energy could be a chance for emerging countries to be part of the solution and not the problem. >> it can sometimes seem like a small thing. one solar panel on a monastery with a micro grid. but these small changes can add up because the people we just saw in that story are not replacing dirty power with clean power. they're skipping coal altogether. here in china, that's not how things went, and people here will pay the price for generations to come. chinese parents have an item on their babies' shopping list that seems straight out of an apocalypse movie. an air purification mask for very small children. that story is next. stay with us. shawn evans: it's 6 am.

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guys, i know being a first-time homeowner is scary, but you don't have to do this. man #2: what if a tree falls on our garage? woman: what if a tornado rips off our roof? flo: you're covered. and you've bundled your home and auto insurance, so you're saving a ton. come on. you don't want to start your new life in a dirty old truck. man #3: hey. man #1: whoa, whoa. flo: sorry. woman: oh. flo: you're safe. you're safe now. woman: i think i'm gonna pass out. can you stop using the bullhorn? flo: i don't make the rules. welcome back to beijing. it's a summer day here, and the air seems relatively clear. but in the city, you don't inhale without checking the pollution index. today it stands at 97, which isn't that bad by local standards, but it would be considered pretty disastrous in any american city. electric cars in china are coming, but this is still a very polluted country. ma jun is considered by many to be the father of the chinese

environmental movement. he started out as an investigative reporter, but these days he's turned the whole country into environmental detectives. >> this is what we call light pollution, then moderate pollution. >> and red is obviously not good? >> yeah. >> his award-winning app allows ordinary people who see something in the air or in the water to say something. every subscriber then gets a realtime picture of how bad the pollution is. >> people can check about all this emission sources data. >> so if they're going somewhere, going to a neighborhood or going on an errand, they can check on this to see what it's like? >> ma jun is 47 years old. in his lifetime, china was transformed from a largely agricultural society to an industrial powerhouse. millions of people were lifted out of poverty, but the sky went dark in the process. was it like this when you were a child? >> it was different, very different.

we did have blue sky, and i learned my swimming in the nearby river. but now, you know, we lost blue sky and much of the clean water. >> how did china lose its blue sky? >> 35 years of massive industrialization and urbanization, and it's very much coal-based energy and pollution-intensive. >> ma jun says inhaling the dirty area is a lot like inhaling cigarette storm. he took me to a store you can probably only find in china. it's the clean air center. it specializes in masks, filters, and other devices to protect families from the pollution. of all the things that we've seen, this one bothers me the most. a baby-size little gas mask. and then this is for what age? this is for like a 1-year-old, 2-year-old? >> under 3. >> under 3. china is now setting higher and higher targets for the switch to renewable fueland decommissioning the oldest, mos

stations. air quality is slowly improving, but it's going to take a generation at best before the sky over beijing is consistently blue again. ma jun says there's a lesson in that for anyone who thinks coal spells progress. >> you know, when i heard some of the efforts, actions trying to weaken the role, the capacity of epa in america, i'm a little bit concerned. i hope that before you take that action, maybe you could come here and get a sense about the outcome, you know, before you make that decision. >> we've talked a lot tonight about pollution, electric cars, and coal. but really this show isn't just about the environment. it's about the direction our country is taking. the world is heading in one way, but president trump, for reasons that can only be guessed at, is heading in the opposite direction. this is why we travel all over the world with this show because

sometimes to really understand what's happening in our country, you need to get some distance to see things from other people's perspective. i have to tell you, from here in beijing right now, that letter the state department sent a few hours ago to the u.n. makes very little sense. that's it for this season of "on assignment." we're grateful to rachel for lending us her fridays. we'll be back in a few months with more stories from other parts of the world. this doesn't happen in our happy little world. >> their world shattered. a young mother strangled. >> nancy, i love you. >> who could have killed her? >> we had a homicide. no suspects. >> also, no evidence. but police found a dark side behind that bright suburban facade. >> she slept with the children and the door locked. >> and