The next book I am reading in my preparation for visiting China, is The Deluge: The Vanishing World of the Yangtze's Three Gorges by Deirdre Chetham. It deals with the impact of the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River. (The three gorges are Qutang Gorge, Wu Gorge, and the Xiling Gorge)
Numerous towns and villages along the Yantzge will be flooded, displacing estimates of 1.5 to 3 million people when the Three Gorges Dam is completed (in 2011). Whole cities and villages have been rebuilt hundreds of feet above their original locations, sometimes on opposite sides of the river. This probably brings into play more millions (and billions) of dollars that will be required for this mass exodus of the millions of displaced people. This massive undertaking has already been compared to such Chinese creations as the Grand Canal, and the Great Wall. It is easy to understand the comparison as one looks out over the massive complex that makes the dam. When completed it will be the largest hydro-electric power station in the world, creating a total electric generating capacity of 22,500 megawatts. The dam itself was created using a model of the TVA system here in the United States. It was created as a means of flood control and drought relief as well as a means of producing hydro-electric power for the millions.
What will be the world's largest hydroelectric dam is under construction in the remote Three Gorges area of China's Upper Yangtze River. Of the nearly 1500 towns that will be submerged when the project is complete, the author focuses on a handful that she knows well from her experiences as a river guide and lecturer. She describes their residents involved in their daily affairs-working, worshiping, getting by-even as the flood waters ineluctably rise around them. In some cases, communities that have existed for thousands of years, whose entire histories and cultures are centered on the river, that have survived flood, famine, and war, will be forced to uproot themselves forever. Against this backdrop, the author also recounts the broader controversies and political deal-making that went into the decision to build the dam. This book had to be written now because in just a few years these people and their world will be gone. -From Library Journal
Numerous towns and villages along the Yantzge will be flooded, displacing estimates of 1.5 to 3 million people when the Three Gorges Dam is completed (in 2011). Whole cities and villages have been rebuilt hundreds of feet above their original locations, sometimes on opposite sides of the river. This probably brings into play more millions (and billions) of dollars that will be required for this mass exodus of the millions of displaced people. This massive undertaking has already been compared to such Chinese creations as the Grand Canal, and the Great Wall. It is easy to understand the comparison as one looks out over the massive complex that makes the dam. When completed it will be the largest hydro-electric power station in the world, creating a total electric generating capacity of 22,500 megawatts. The dam itself was created using a model of the TVA system here in the United States. It was created as a means of flood control and drought relief as well as a means of producing hydro-electric power for the millions.
What will be the world's largest hydroelectric dam is under construction in the remote Three Gorges area of China's Upper Yangtze River. Of the nearly 1500 towns that will be submerged when the project is complete, the author focuses on a handful that she knows well from her experiences as a river guide and lecturer. She describes their residents involved in their daily affairs-working, worshiping, getting by-even as the flood waters ineluctably rise around them. In some cases, communities that have existed for thousands of years, whose entire histories and cultures are centered on the river, that have survived flood, famine, and war, will be forced to uproot themselves forever. Against this backdrop, the author also recounts the broader controversies and political deal-making that went into the decision to build the dam. This book had to be written now because in just a few years these people and their world will be gone. -From Library Journal
There is also an excellent NPR series on the Three Gorges Dam and the impact on the people and landscape in this area of China.
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