Three Gorges Dam Is Said to Hurt Areas Downstream
EDWARD WONG
CHONGQING, China — A Chinese official says the planners of the Three Gorges Dam failed to properly gauge its effects on lakes and other bodies of water downstream, according to a report on Thursday in Shanghai Daily, an English-language newspaper.
China Daily/Reuters
Levels are dropping at Poyang, one of the two largest freshwater lakes in China, and an official said the dam was partly to blame.
How Hwee Young/European Pressphoto Agency
The Honghu Lake, in central China's Hubei Province, has dried up in the drought.
The New York Times
As a result, the dam has contributed to lower water levels in two of China’s largest freshwater lakes, raising the threat to them during long droughts, the report said. Large areas of central and southern China are suffering from the worst drought in 50 years, and the levels have plummeted in the Yangtze River and other bodies of water, including here in Chongqing.
Wang Jingquan, the official quoted by the newspaper, said water levels in the two lakes — Dongting in Hunan Province and Poyang in Jiangxi Province — had fallen in part because of the storage of water in the reservoir behind the dam, which is on the Yangtze.
In addition, the dam has had an impact on fish breeding and the growth of plants in the lower reaches of the Yangtze, said Mr. Wang, who works in a flood control and drought relief office that is linked to the Yangtze River Water Resources Committee. He said proper discharge from the reservoir would help the lakes.
“We failed to think of all the impacts that the dam might bring about when designing the dam, but its advantages should outweigh the disadvantages,” he said, according to Shanghai Daily, which cited Xinmin Evening News. The dam provided 84 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity last year.
Mr. Wang’s statements are the latest by an official and come as Chinese news organizations are increasingly discussing the impact of the dam as the drought drags on. Two weeks ago, senior Chinese officials admitted that there were “urgent problems” associated with the dam, the world’s largest hydroelectric project. The admission came in a vague statement from the State Council, China’s cabinet. “Although the Three Gorges project provides huge comprehensive benefits, urgent problems must be resolved regarding the smooth relocation of residents, ecological protection and geological disaster prevention,” the Council said.
Plans for the 600-foot-high dam were criticized at an early stage, but the Chinese government pressed ahead. Besides the ecological impact, the dam displaced 1.4 million people when the water levels upstream were raised.
The central government is also trying to deal with concerns over another ambitious water project, the South-North Water Diversion, which would siphon water from the Yangtze to Beijing and other northern cities. The drought in the regions along the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze has underscored worries about channeling the river’s water to the north.
Cities are turning to increasingly desperate measures to combat the drought’s effects. The island city of Zhoushan in Zhejiang Province started water rationing on Wednesday, according to Xinhua, the state news agency. Residents have been told they can use running water for only five hours a day because the city can no longer depend on 20 of its 29 reservoirs. From January to May, rainfall in Zhoushan was the lowest on record, Xinhua said.
On Thursday, Xinhua said that rainfall along the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze was down 40 percent to 60 percent from the average, with the totals being lower than at any time since 1951. The report cited data from the State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters.
In Jiangsu Province’s Sushui County, fish and clams are dying, and crab-breeding farms are parched and cracked, Xinhua said. At Honghu Lake, fish spawning has been affected, said Zeng Xiaodong, leader of the Honghu marshland management office. “The drought has done considerable damage to the ecological environment of Honghu Lake,” he said.