Text: Xiao Peng's brilliant notes
Editor|Xiao Peng's brilliant notes
[Preface]
When it comes to China's infrastructure, everyone in the world will now give a sigh of admiration, in recent years' infrastructure development, China has always been called "infrastructure madness" because of its strong infrastructure technology.
There are many great projects on the mainland, and the scale is so large, and the amount of investment is so large that many of them are beyond the imagination of the Chinese people, and of course the value they bring is also huge.
Among them, there is a project that not only shocked the people of the whole country, but also the countries of the world expressed shock at the completion of such a project, because this project is not only a matter of scale and funds, but also the difficulties encountered in the construction of the project.
However, the mainland's participants in this project have overcome these difficulties and created an engineering miracle in 40 years, which is still playing a steady stream of value and significance.
That's right, this project is the mainland's south-to-north water diversion project, the construction process of this project really carries too many legends, and at the same time, after the completion of the construction outside, it has played a great value and significance.
In the nine years since its completion, what has changed about the South-to-North Water Diversion Project, and what unimaginable difficulties have been overcome in the process of construction?
【Establishment of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project】
Water plays an irreplaceable and important role in the survival and development of human beings, and in the continent, two different regions, face diametrically opposed problems.
There is a lot of rain in the south, especially in the summer, and it is a period of great floods, although the mainland has built the Three Gorges and other water conservancy projects, but in the face of powerful natural disasters, human beings still have no power to resist them.
Therefore, in the process of development, some areas in the south are still inevitably affected by floods, and houses and fields have suffered huge losses.
The North China Plain, on the other hand, is facing a drought and water shortage, especially in the northwest region, where even people often face water shortages.
The uneven distribution of water resources also affected the development of the mainland's regional economy to a large extent, and during the critical period of economic revival at that time, the development of various fields had a very large demand for water resources.
So the mainland wondered if there was a way to transport water resources from the south to the north, so that the problems in both regions could be effectively solved.
The idea of transferring water from the south to the north came out because the water resources of the Yangtze River can be said to be very rich in natural resources, with a water flow of about 960 billion cubic meters a year.
This plan has been put forward since 1952, and the idea has become a reality, but the technical problems faced in the middle are even "against the sky", and it is necessary to cross the long lakes, seas, mountains and rivers.
The length of the canal is 4,350 kilometers, and the migration of residents from the areas involved in the middle is also a very big problem.
Therefore, this can be called a world-class project, and there have been countless difficulties in investigating the feasibility of this project.
The expedition took a full 50 years, and the pattern conceived at that time was to form three water networks in the east, middle and west, and then form a water system network with the Yangtze River, the Yellow River and the Haihuai River.
At that time, it was expected that if the project was realized, the lives of nearly 500 million people living along the route would be improved as a result.
[What has changed in the 10th year of the South-to-North Water Diversion?]
As of the 18th of last month, the three networks of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project had delivered a total of 70 billion cubic meters of water.
More than 7 provinces and cities along the route, and more than 40 large and medium-sized cities have been positively affected, and the beneficiary population has far exceeded the previous prediction, exceeding 176 million.
First of all, the most direct is that the pattern of water resources has changed dramatically, and the annual water diversion of this project was only about 2 billion cubic meters, but now it has reached tens of billions.
The uneven distribution of water resources has been greatly improved, for example, in Beijing, where 70% of the water supply is diverted from the south to the north.
This also reflects from the side that the safety of drinking water for mainland residents has been effectively guaranteed, and that when the South-to-North Water Diversion Project was not yet completed, residents in some areas in the north drank water from the Yellow River.
But looking at the present, people drink not only clean water, but also high-quality water, and I wonder if you still have the memory of drawing water from the well in the first place.
At that time, if you didn't let it sit for a while before using it, the yellowing of the washed clothes was very serious, but now this rarely happens.
In addition, the adequate supply of water resources has also led to economic development to a large extent, and along the South-to-North Water Diversion Route, there are some major national development strategic projects, such as the coordinated development of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, the ecological protection of the Yellow River Basin, and some regional construction.
All of these need to be supported by adequate water resources, and in the development process of these projects, the development of the South-to-North Water Transfer Project has provided these projects with very rich water resources to meet their needs.
In addition, in terms of construction, the industrial structure along the route has also been greatly upgraded and adjusted due to the abundance of water resources, which not only realizes the intensive and efficient use of water resources, but also drives the growth of regional GDP along the route.
For example, in 2002, after the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal was included in the eastern route of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project, it successfully realized the entire water flow.
In this area, a large shipping material distribution center has also been built, and it has developed into the largest inland port in Jiangbei, which has greatly promoted the development of this field.
Moreover, the full supply of water resources has also greatly improved some of the surrounding ecological environment, and since the South-to-North Water Diversion Project was fully opened, the ecological security of the lakes and rivers along the route has been further guaranteed.
For example, since the water transmission in the middle line, a large number of rivers and lakes along the line have been promoted, such as Daqing River, Baiyangdian Lake, etc., and the ecological environment of rivers and lakes has changed, which also plays a very important role in the development of the local economy.
At the beginning of this year, relevant statistics showed that the task of transferring water from the south to the north between 2022 and 2023 has been exceeded.
Among them, the cumulative water diversion of the central route was 7.41 billion cubic meters, the annual plan was overfulfilled by 112%, the eastern route was completed by 100%, the water diversion of the northern route reached 277 million cubic meters, the annual plan was completed by 102%, and the ecological water replenishment reached 795 million cubic meters.
【Mankind's Greatest Project】
So why is it called the greatest project? It starts with the difficulties encountered during the construction of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project, which started in 2022.
During the construction of the middle line project, it was necessary to go all the way north, from Jiangsu through the Yellow River to Tianjin, and the problem that needed to be solved in the middle was to let the river flow upward.
At that time, a total of 13 pumping stations and 160 large pumps were built, and the amount of work was very large, and the difficulties that needed to be overcome could not be summed up in one sentence.
During the construction of the middle line, a pumping station was also needed to transport water, but a new dam was needed on the basis of the old one.
In this way, the area of water can be increased, and more water can be transported, and one of the first issues to consider when building a new dam on a dam is the problem of seamless integration.
Because the natural law of thermal expansion and cold contraction can easily lead to cracks, considering this problem, the engineers of the mainland have controlled the temperature of the concrete during the actual operation.
A total of 686 rivers were crossed by canals in the middle of the project, and a total of 27 river aqueducts were built during the construction of the project, which were additionally reinforced with steel bars to avoid possible cracks.
The eastern route had to cross the Yellow River, and the only solution was to build an underwater tunnel, which was very difficult to dig underwater, and it took the shield machine more than 500 days to dig it at that time.
These are just a microcosm of the difficulties encountered in the South-to-North Water Diversion Project, which will actually be even more difficult in the actual construction process.
The cost of its own investment is also very high, the construction of the east line and the west line, the cost reached 254.6 billion, and now the west line is still in the process of construction, because its topography is really a challenge to the limit.
The western line is located on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, not only the terrain is complex, but the most important thing is that the altitude is also high, and the construction difficulty is much higher than that of the other two lines.
The cost of investment may be even higher, but it is undeniable that if the construction of the Western Front can be successfully completed, the benefits to all parties will be huge.
From the benefits it has brought to the overall development pattern of the continent, as well as the amount of money invested and the degree of difficulties overcome, it is all world-class, so it is also called the greatest project in human history.
However, there are pros and cons to everything, and in the construction of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project, there have also been losses to some local areas due to the encroachment and destruction of industrial construction.
And when the area along the route becomes rich and industry develops, the risk of pollution is further increased, and the relocation of residents is inevitably lost.
The mainland has also been trying its best to solve these problems, as much as possible to make up for these shortcomings, and therefore invested a huge amount of money, can only say that "reluctant children can't catch wolves", the construction of this project is still a milestone.
Links to previous issues
China's first abolished municipality: GDP has exceeded 1.7 trillion yuan, will it be directly under the central government again in the future?
China's biggest oolong incident, which was supposed to build a power plant in the desert, accidentally acquired a pasture
Taiwan's large-scale power outage, the Taiwan authorities blame the mainland, the mainland: do I need to teach me how to do it?
Resources:
On January 12, 2024, People's Daily Online reported on "Ecological Water Replenishment of 795 Million Cubic Meters, the Annual Water Transfer Task of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project Exceeded the Fulfillment".
On March 20, 2024, Huanqiu.com reported on "The cumulative water diversion of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project exceeded 70 billion cubic meters".
On November 15, 2023, China News Network reported on "10 Years of Water Supply on the Eastern Route of the South-to-North Water Diversion: Smoothing the North-South Economic Cycle and Benefiting Water Use in 101 Counties and Cities in 3 Provinces".