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Emergency plan urged for Three Gorges dam
By Liu Li (China Daily)
Updated: 2006-03-07 05:54
Chen Jingqiu: Mulling over the Three Gorges Dam
project.
A top political adviser urged the government to have an emergency plan ready
in case of serious water pollution accidents at the Three Gorges Dam.
"Otherwise, if petrochemical plants in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River
have an explosion or leak, damage around the dam project will be much bigger
than that in Northeast China's Songhua River last year," Chen Jingqiu, a member
of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National
Committee, told China Daily yesterday.
Water already flows more slowly as the construction of the dam draws to a
close and will slow down even more after the dam begins operations, according to
Chen, a professor at Chongqing University in Southwest China.
With a length of 1,983 metres and a height of 185 metres, the dam is one of
the biggest hydropower structures in the world and is a key part to developing
the Yangtze River. Construction of the project will reportedly be completed in
May.
In fact, water pollution caused by petrochemical plants at the upper reaches
of the Yangtze River has occurred.
Caused by industrial waste water, a pollution accident happened two years ago
along the Tuojiang River, a branch of the Yangtze, in Southwest China's Sichuan
Province. Economic losses totalled 300 million yuan (US$37 million).
(China Daily 03/07/2006 page2)
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