Drought Prompts Closure Of 100+ Hydro Power Plants In South China - ENN

[hatrack]

SHANGHAI, China − "More than 100 hydroelectric plants in southern China have been ordered shut to preserve water for farming amid an extended severe drought.

The closures have reduced power generation in Guangdong province by 1 million kilowatt hours since Oct. 15, according to a report viewed Tuesday on a Water Resources Ministry Web site.

Eastern Guangdong has been struck by its worst drought in 51 years, severely affecting water levels in the Dongjiang River that is the source of drinking water for more than 36 million people.

About 65 percent of the province's land area has been affected by water shortages, parched crops and reduced power supply, reports in Guangdong's official media said. Drought has affected more than 730,000 hectares (1.8 million acres) of crops in the province, a key agricultural region as well as a manufacturing powerhouse, the official Xinhua News Agency reported earlier this month.

About 36,000 hectares (89,000 acres) of crops have been abandoned altogether, Xinhua said. Guangdong Vice Governor Li Ronggen has ordered rationing of water to industry and a tiered pricing system for water amid measures to encourage conservation, according to reports in the province's official media."

EDIT

http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=439

[Viking12]

1. With China's ever growing demand for energy

this will surely prompt the development of other electricity genrating facilities, probably coal. Not that the hydro was environmentally benign, but the last thing we need is more carbon pouring into the atmosphere.

[Massacure]

2. If the dams are there, you may as well use them.

[Viking12]

3. That was kind of my point

I wasn't as clear as I should have been. However, a lack of water diminishes their production making the turn to more polltuing sources likely.

[Dogmudgeon]

4. Most of China seems to be becoming a desert

This is a long-term process, I know, but what's happening to China now seems to rival the Dust Bowl in North America during the 1930s.

The Dust Bowl was eventually "fixed" with better agricultural practices, and a decades-long improvement in rainfall. But China is on the other side of each of these historic waves -- the worldwide drought could be here to stay, and the Chinese population is putting greater and greater stress on all their resources.

--p!