South-North Water Transfer Project

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The South-North Water Transfer Project (Chinese:南水北调工程; Pinyin: Nán shuǐ běi diào gōng chéng) is a proposed plan by the People's Republic of China to divert water from the Yangtze River to the Yellow River and Hai River. Northern China's climate is much drier than that of Southern China, and the Yellow River and Hai River carries a much lower volume of water than the Yangtze. As a result of diverting water for industrial and agricultural uses, the Yellow River has often gone dry in its lower reaches in recent decades and some of the Hai River tributaries almost dried out throughout the year. The water transfer project seeks to increase the flow of the Yellow River and Hai River by diverting water north from the Yangtze.

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[edit] Project's Conception

The idea for the South-North Water Transfer Project originated from Mao Zedong who said, "Southern water is plentiful, northern water scarce. If at all possible, borrowing some water would be good." After his comments, the Chinese Water Works Department conducted several studies on the project. After decades of study, the South-North Water Transfer Project settled on three different proposals for routes: The western route is in the western headwaters of the rivers where Yangtze River and Yellow River are closest to one another; the central route is from the upper reaches of the Han River (a tributary of Yangtze River) to Beijing and Tianjin; and the eastern route using the course of the Grand Canal.

[edit] Eastern Route

The Grand Canal is currently being upgraded. Water from the Yangtze River will be drawn into the canal in Jiangdu City, where a giant 400 cu.m./s. pumping station was built already in the 1980s, and is then fed uphill by pumping stations along the Grand Canal and through a tunnel under the Yellow River, from where it can flow downhill to reservoirs near Tianjin. Construction on the Eastern Route officially began on December 27, 2002, and water is supposed to reach Tianjin by 2012. However, water pollution has affected the viability of this project.

[edit] Central Route

The central route is from Danjiangkou Reservoir on Han river to Beijing. This route is built on the North China Plain and water can flow all the way to Beijing by gravity. The main engineering challenge is to build a tunnel under the Yellow River to move the water to the north of Yellow River. The water from Danjiangkou Reservoir is expected to reach Beijing by 2008 and the whole project is expected to complete around 2010. The major difficulty is the resettlement of ~250,000 persons around Danjiangkou Reservoir and along the route. The other problem is the influence on the Han River, where ~1/3 water are diverted. One long-term solution is to build another canal to divert water from the Three Gorges Dam to Danjiangkou Reservoir.

[edit] Western Route

The western route is to divert water from the headwater of Yangtze (and also the headwaters of Mekong or Salween downstream) into the headwater of Yellow River. In order to move the water through the drainage divide between these rivers, huge dams and long tunnels are needed to be built. The feasiblility of this route is still under study and this project won't start in the near future. Also, since many nations (Burma, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam) rely on these rivers downstream, plans have met with stiff resistance from these nations.

[edit] Project Controversy

Since the introduction of the project, it has created widespread controversy. Opponents to the project believe it is a waste of resources, it could create a large number of migrant people but transfers too little water, it won't provide an economic benefit, the dry season could cause the Yangtze River to suffer from water shortages, it would influence the Yangtze River's transportation, and it could cause a biological disaster. Defenders of the project believe the Yangtze River has a plentiful supply of water with large amounts of water flowing into the ocean annually. They argue that transferring one portion to the poorly irrigated areas of the North could solve the North's water scarcity issue.

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