Three Gorges Dam - Next Great Wonder of the World?
Or next great horror no one should visit?
When Three Gorges Dam in China wraps up the final stages of construction in 2009, it will be an end to more than 17 years of labor. It will soar 607 ft, and will be 1.4 miles long by 3,700 ft wide. It will be the largest dam in the world.
Power PollutionAnd quite possible the most terrible.
Filling the dam's reservoir meant 1.5 million people in 13 cities have been forced to dissemble their homes - brick by brick - and then relocate. Ed Burtynski's images portray and nightmarish landscape around the dam, which looks like a war-torn countryside, an ecological disaster. See for yourself:
A National Geographic video from November 2007 shows the terrible human and ecological cost. Reports this week say the houses that have been rebuilt will have to again dismantled and moved even further away from the river.
So, what's the purpose of the dam?
1n 1954 a flood killed 33,169 people and forced thousands more to relocate. Officials hoped the dam will prevent another such tragedy.
The dam's 32 generators will produce enough electricity that coal consumption in China should decrease by 31 million tons per year, which will cut emissions by 100 million tons of greenhouse gas. Opponents to the project say the Three Gorges Dam won't help reduce carbon emissions. Hydroelectric dams emit carbon in the form of methane.
All of this comes with a cool $25 billion price tag -which doesn't even begin to address the soaring costs to the environment and human lives.
What do you think of the Three Gorges Dam? Do you think the Chinese government should have acted more responsibly and researched the impact before beginning construction?
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