The Three Gorges Dam

The reservoir's 10.4 trillion gallons of water will force almost two million valley residents to move from their homes and farmlands with fertile land, as well as the ancient tombs of their ancestors. The people from 13 cities, hundreds nearly thousands of villages, 955 businesses and factories, farmers will have to evacuate 115,000 acres of the richest farmland along the river basin and relocate in unknown, possibly inhospitable territory with lower living standards. This essay will cover the social, economic and environmental effects of this monumental scheme. Where are the Three Gorges? : [IMAGE] The waters draining into this huge river, some 6380 Km, come from a massive catchment area.

Introduction On October 30th, 2004 a flash flood struck the Manoa Valley on the island of Oahu. The flood damaged more than 60 homes and caused more than one million dollars in damage to the University of Hawaii. Based on several events that have occurred Meteorological Causes & Concepts In order to understand what happened that day in Hawaii, we must first examine the common causes of flash floods and how they occur. According to DisasterCenter.com floods occur when there is prolonged rainfall, heavy, intense rainfall, or some kind of jam that overflows in a river or stream. These types of floods occur within a few days after the rainfall and can last as long as a week.

There were a record number of deaths, which range from an incredible a hundred and forty five thousand in a day to Four million people overall. After further research they figured about a million people drowned and more than 3 million died from disease and starvation. The most affected areas were the Yangtze River, the Huai River, and the Yellow River. Some of the most rainfall happened between July and November in 1931; China experienced some strange weather. In the years running up to the disaster, China had been suffering from a long and hot drought throughout the whole country.

Do the people in China get any benefit from this project? This paper will discuss about the environmental impact, the social consequence, and the current status of Government’s plans toward the Three Gorges Dam. Flood control is the main reason for building the Three Gorges Dam. Since Han Dynasty (300BC), flood has been killed millions of lives, and destroyed millions of acres of farmland and homes every ten years. Billions of money has been spent on recovering the damage.

The Three Gorges Dam in China is the largest hydroelectric dam ever built. The Three Gorges Dam (TGD) was built to prevent flooding, as well as produce energy. Flooding has plagued the Yangtze for centuries; Chinese authorities estimate that some 300,000 people were killed in the 20th century's largest Yangtze River floods. In 2012 during the peak flood season, with a peak flow of 70,000 cubic meters of water per second (Angela), the TGD performed as expected controlling the floodwaters, from flooding the Yangtze saving thousands of lives. Production of power has been as inclusive as preventing flooding, “the hydropower produced by the TGD will supply only produce 3% of Chinas energy needs (originally assumed to supply 10%, however the rise in population and demand, has decreased it to 3%.)

In the beginning of the construction of the Three Gorges Dam, there were several problems. There were several protestors and opinions about the dam before the Three Gorges Dam project was even started.1 China has had history of several dam failures in the mid-1970s that were responsible for thousands of deaths. The three gorges (Xiling, Wu, and Qutang) have scenery that is a tourist attraction.2 The dam was going to be a little over 600 feet tall, 7500 feet wide, and hold over 97 trillion gallons of water. Because of all of the population increase, China started using coal power plants1 and shipping, which causes acid rain over the region making the Yangtze River is one of the most polluted rivers in the world.4 It does not help that the Yangtze River runs right through Chinas industrial heartland. Using the river to transport their goods to other parts or China adds to the pollution.2 Pollution from mines, hospitals, and garbage dumping is another big problem for the river because the pollution is building up around the dam.1 With the Three Gorges Dam will come landslides because of the rising water tables and the large slopes with unstable soil from local farming causing more sediment being added to the river.3 And because the dam lies on a fault line there will also be an escalation of earthquakes.

Already scientists have observed that more than 75% of the recent economic losses are caused by natural hazards which can be attributed to wind storms, floods, droughts and other climate related hazards. In the year 2008, the U.S. state of Iowa was on the front pages of newspapers all around the world. Weeks of heavy rain in the Midwest caused rivers to swell and levees to break. Millions of acres of farmland are now underwater, their plantings most likely destroyed. By March, Iowa had tied its third-highest monthly snowfall in 121 years of record keeping, and then came the rain.

Hassanzadeh and Zarghami (2011) to determine the main factors in declining the Urmia Lake level using system dynamics modeling showed that contribution of reducing water entering the lake (due to overuse of surface waters) as well as climate change is about 65%, constructing dam is 25% and the effect of reduction of rainfall on the lake surface is only 10 percent. For Urima Lake, Deljo et.al. (2013) found that over a 40- Yr period, annual average of precipitation has decrease by 9.2% and average maximum temperature has increased by 0.8°C. Winter and spring have had particularly visible changes. Research using dynamic systems was conducted to determine the most effective factors on the lake.

The Earth’s surface is covered by over two-thirds of water. With half of the world being covered by water; pollution in the water is a very big crisis that can actually be reduced to some extent. Water pollution is a human problem because it seems to be a recent development that started round the end of the 19th century. Scientists say that “humans have limits with an estimated 7 billion people on the planet, and pollution is a sign of exceeded pollution. According to the WWF (World Wildlife Fund) pollution is a serious problem.

In addition to the water evaporated, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (DWP) began diverting Mono Lake's water and approximately 58% of its natural inflow (annually) to supply 13% of the city of Los Angeles's water supply in 1940 (Stine 1991). Because lake volume fluctuates in response to varying inflow and evaporation, the late-water concentration and composition can experience substantial change through time (Rogers 1992). A high concentration of soluble compounds and salts formed inherently as evaporation occurred, and minerals and compounds were left behind. Runoff, erosional sediments and precipitation (rain and snowfall are limited in the Eastern side due to the rainshadow effect) from the Sierra Nevada accumulate in the Mono Basin. Also ephemeral perennial streams from the Sierra Nevada flow into the Mono Basin.