Rounkup: Work on Three Gorges Dam's main wall starts final sprint

Approximately 220 cubic meters of concrete had been put in place by 9:00 on Friday morning for the main section of the Three Gorges Dam, the world's largest.

The 1,017.5-cubic-meter final part of the concrete placement of the dam's main wall, began at 4:00 a.m. on Friday, will finish at around 2:00 p.m. on Saturday as scheduled, said officials with the Yichang Qingyun United Hydropower Company, which is undertaking the work.

The overall concrete placement for the dam, involving 16 million cubic meters of concrete, is proceeding in two phases in the middle reach of the Yangtze River, China's longest. The first phase, for the northern-bank dam section, was completed in October 2002, while the second, for the southern-bank dam section, started at the end of 2002.

The officials said no penetrating fissures that could potentially undermine the overall structure of the dam has been detected in the southern-bank section. This was related to temperature control in the concrete placement. Icebricks are being added to concrete mixers to ensure temperature be controlled at no higher than 14 degrees Celsius for the placement, the officials added.

Actually, the completed section of the dam's main wall is 184.8 meters high, with the remaining 0.2 meters reserved for building the highway on the top of the dam.

Situated near the Xiling Gorge, the easternmost gorge of the Three Gorges, the Three Gorges Project is the largest water control project in the world.

Initially envisioned by Sun Yat-sen, the forerunner of China's democratic revolution, in 1918, the project has undergone protracted debates before it was approved by the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, in 1992. Launched in 1993,the Three Gorges Project, with investment initially estimated at 203.9 billion yuan (25.2 billion U.S.dollars), will have 26 generators with a combined generating capacity of 18.2 million kilowatts. The entire Project is scheduled for completion in 2009 and by then, it will be able to generate 84.7 billion kwh of electricity annually.

The Three Gorges, which consist of Qutang, Wuxia and Xiling Gorges, extend for about 200 km on the upper and middle reaches of the Yangtze. They have become a popular world-class tourist destination noted for beautiful natural landscape and a great number of historical and cultural relics.

Apart from generating clean energy, the landscape-altering mega project, with a designed water storage capacity of 39.3 billion cubic meters, will also function to harness flooding and benefit shipping.

A total of 1.13 million people have been relocated to make way for the project.

Source: Xinhua