Yangtze River water level at 140-year low

In a new sign of China’s water and environmental crisis, cargo boats on the Yangtze have been stranded on river banks as its levels have fallen to a 140-year low.

Forty boats have run aground since October on the lower stretches of China’s longest river, which is both a water supply and industrial thoroughfare for a region of 400 million people.

Government scientists blamed an extended drought in southern and south-western China, which caused widespread water shortages last autumn.

But they also admitted that too much water had been held up by the giant Three Gorges Dam, which was built not only to generate electricity but also to control the Yangtze’s devastating summer floods.

The river authorities said that the dam was responsible for a drop of 50 per cent in the river’s flow downstream.

Global warming, population pressure, and inefficient use of resources have all contributed to a nationwide water shortage.

The Yellow River, which flows through central and northern China, regularly dries up along much of its course during the dry season, contributing to the growing desertification of the north.

The fate of the Yangtze is particularly disturbing as the authorities are relying on a massive water diversion scheme currently being built at a cost of £32bn to take water from the Yangtze to the Yellow River.

Last week, the water level on the Yangtze at Wuhan, in central China east of the dam, fell to less than 14 metres for the first time since 1866, according to local media.

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Source: The Telegraph

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