DAM-L Power stations on Lancang to control flow of water (fwd)

["D. Murray" <dianne@sandelman.ottawa.on.ca>]

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Date: Thu, 7 Feb 2002 10:13:42 -0800 (PST)
Message-ID: <200202071813.g17IDgS19059@DaVinci.NetVista.net>
Subject: Power stations on Lancang to control flow of water
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020402 China-- Power stations on Lancang to control flow of water
  (ACCORDING TO PROFESSOR HE DAMING)

02/04/2002

KUNMING: Power stations built on the Lancang River in Southwest China's 
Yunnan Province are expected to regulate and control the flow of water in 
the lower reaches during the dry and flood seasons, experts say.
By regulating the flow of water, power stations are expected to be able to 
make the river- known as Mekong in the lower reaches in other Southeast 
Asian countries-more navigable, said He Daming, with the Asia International 
River Centre of Yunnan University.

Based on research of hydrologic data between 1953 and 1993, He and his 
assistant Feng Yan concluded that the run-off from the river during the dry 
season is on average 689 cubic metres per second.

When the Xiaowan and Nuozhadu power stations are finished on the river, the 
run-off of the Mekong will reach 1,869 cubic metres per second in the 
driest season, 1,180 cubic metres more than the average water flow in 
normal years.

The Xiaowan power station, being built on the Lancang, will eventually form 
a reservoir with a storage capacity of 14.94 billion cubic metres.

Navigation on the Mekong can be dated back to 1954 when Viet Nam, Laos and 
Cambodia signed a treaty on managing river navigation. China began to 
dredge the watercourse of the Lancang in the 1960s, and now a 293-kilometre 
section of the river in China is open to ships of 100-300 deadweight tons.

In June, an 886-kilometre section of the Lancang-Mekong watercourse, from 
Simao Port in Yunnan Province to Louang Prabang Port in the Laos opened to 
commercial navigation.

The Lancang River starts in the Tanggula Mountain on the Qinghai-Tibet 
Plateau and runs more than 4,800 kilometres, cutting through China, 
Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Viet Nam before emptying into the 
South China Sea.

He has calculated that the development of navigation on the Lancang-Mekong 
River is cost-efficient and will greatly shorten the transport distance, 
time and costs from Southwest China to Europe, Africa and Southeast Asia.

Sources with the Yunnan Provincial Communications Bureau said currently 
China, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand have more than 100 ships sailing on the 
Lancang-Mekong River course, transporting 150,000 to 200,000 tons of cargo 
annually.

Xinhua

copyright 2002 by chinadaily.com.cn. all rights reserved.
http://www.chinadaily.net/cndy/2002-02-04/55299.html

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