Nizhni Tagil, Russia, is one of the most polluted places in Europe. The locals call it «the city of the colorful sky.» Nestled in the depths of the rugged Ural mountain range about 1,100 miles from Moscow, Nizhni Tagil’s 360,000 residents are paying a heavy price for living in a city that’s become an industrial powerhouse of Russia. Dominating the landscape of Soviet architecture, rivers and forests, the chimneys of the metropolitan area’s 606 factories — one for every 600 residents, more or less — chug out non-stop clouds of toxic smoke that poison the life of the city. Nizhni Tagil is a «monocities,» cities designed exclusively for industry, founded on a trade in metal extraction that goes back hundreds of years. Explorers discovered rich mineral deposits in the soil in 1696 and the first factory was founded in 1833. Lacking in modern equipment, the quantity of waste produced by the factories is startling — an estimated 600,000 tons a year, about 1.6 tons per city resident. Nizhni Tagil has the highest rate of stomach and lung cancer in Russia, and the rate of respiratory problems in children is 50 percent higher than the national average. Apart from factories the other thing Nizhni Tagil has in abundance is prisons. There are eight, including a special detention facility for policemen. Nizhni Tagil’s youth population, facing the equally grim prospects of unemployment or employment in the factories, seems lost. A documentary by the Russian producer Maria Morina claimed that as many as 30,000 people were addicted to drugs in this frozen corner of the Urals. Parties offer a break from reality and the bitterly cold nights, where temperatures can drop to -31 Fahrenheit (-35 Celsius). Foreign house DJs are invited to play all-night raves in spaces that can host up to 3,000 people