New phase of huge water diversion to capital started

Home>>China

Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, December 31, 2003

New phase of huge water diversion to capital started

Construction began Tuesday on the central section of China's ambitious south-to-north water diversion project to ease the severe water shortage around the capital city.

DISCUSSION

CHINESE

SEND TO FRIEND

Construction began Tuesday on the central section of China's ambitious south-to-north water diversion project to ease the severe water shortage around the capital city.

The office of the project's commission under the State Council made the announcement in Beijing Tuesday. Work on two inverted siphons, part of the Beijing-Shijiazhuang section of the middle line, began in Beijing and the Hutuo River near Shijiazhuang, capital of Hebei Province.

The project to relieve the country's drought-ridden north by diverting water from the Yangtze River, is larger even than the Three Gorges hydro-power and conservancy project.

Up to 44.8 billion cubic meters of water will be diverted through three canals to the north, about the annual volume of the Yellow River in a normal year.

The central section of the project, expected to attract investment of 92 billion yuan (11.1 billion US dollars) in its first phase, aims to divert water from the Yangtze River to Beijing by 2010.

The annual per capita amount of water in Beijing stands at about 300 cubic meters, while the international benchmark for an area suffering acute water shortage is 1,000 cubic meters or less per person.

The government has decided to accelerate part of the central section project in northern China's Hebei province so as to alleviate the imminent problem in Beijing as fast as possible.

This part of the project could provide 400 to 500 million cubic meters of water for Beijing for emergency use by 2007, said Zhang Jiyao, director of the office of the project's commission.

The water would come from four large reservoirs in Hebei Province, and the total investment for this section would be 17.3 billion yuan, Zhang said.

About 90 percent of the plain around Beijing would need the diverted water on the completion of the central section project in 2010, statistics estimated.

The south-to-north water diversion project consists of three south-to-north canals each running about 1,300 kilometres across the eastern, middle and western parts of the country.

Last December, the central government gave the green light for the construction of the middle and eastern lines of the water diversion project, China's most ambitious scheme to divert water from the Yangtze River in the south into the parched north.

In addition to these siphons being built, work on two other sub-projects related to the line in Shandong and Jiangsu provinces has already begun.

"Work on more sub-projects will follow in other sections along the two lines early next year," sources with Zhang's office confirmed.

The 307-kilometre long Beijing-Shijiazhuang section is a key part of the middle line to link four reservoirs in Hebei with Beijing as an emergency water supply channel to help ease up water shortage for Beijing, according to Jiao Zhizhong, director of Beijing's municipal water resources office.

"Upon completion, the Beijing-Shijiazhuang section, with an investment of 17.3 billion yuan (US$2 billion), will take 500 million cubic metres of water per year from the Gangnan, Huangbizhuang, Yukuai and Xidayang reservoirs in Hebei to Beijing to ensure the capital's security in water supply," Jiao said.

Overall, the south-to-north project is crucial for relieving water shortages, improving the ecosystem and promoting China's "Go West" strategy, experts say.

Specifically, it would significantly alleviate acute water shortages along the Yellow River, Huaihe River and Haihe River, eastern Shandong and some areas in northwestern China, experts predict.

The three lines of the project will divert water from the upper, middle and lower reaches of the water-rich Yangtze River into the country's drought-prone north.

The middle line is to take water from the Danjiangkou Reservoir in Central China's Hubei Province into large cities including Beijing, Tianjin, Shijiazhuang and Zhengzhou in Henan Province.

The eastern line is designed to transfer water from East China's Jiangsu Province into Tianjin while hard spadework on the west line continues.

To be built in three stages, the three canals will link up the country's four major rivers: the Yangtze River, Yellow River, Huaihe River and Haihe River.

Upon its completion scheduled around 2050, the entire project involving nearly 500 billion yuan (US$60 billion), will deliver 44.8 billion cubic metres of water into the parched north each year, about the annual volume of water in the Yellow River, to optimize China's existing water resources for future sustainability.

By People's Daily Online

Questions?Comments? Click here

Water supply shortage in Beijing to be solved by 2010

More efforts urged to tackle water deficiency in Beijing

Water diversion helps ease Beijing thirst

World's second large desert thrown on green scarf ( 3 Messages)

China offers emergency humanitarian aid to Iran ( 5 Messages)

Will China's rise trigger Sino-US confrontation? ( 24 Messages)

"Tree direct links" provide more security guarantee for Taiwan people ( 4 Messages)

Gas field blowout kills 191in SW China, 290-odd hospitalized ( 22 Messages)