This Day, That Year

Item from July 21, 1981, in China Daily: The partially completed Gezhouba Dam, China’s largest hydroelectric and river navigation project, withstood a severe test on Sunday as a flood passed down the Yangtze River.

More than 200,000 people have been mobilized to guard the dikes along the river’s lower reaches, where fertile rice and cotton fields are threatened.

The Three Gorges Dam, the world’s largest hydroelectric project, has generated 1 trillion kilowatt-hours of power since operations began in 2003. Construction of the 180 billion yuan ($26.6 billion) project started in late 1994.

The dam, which has an installed capacity of 22.5 million kWh, is located in the middle reaches of the country’s longest river, the Yangtze River, in Hubei province.

Last year, the dam generated 93.5 billion kWh of electricity.

In addition to generating power, the project also controls flooding and helps regulate the river’s shipping traffic.

It consists of a dam, 32 hydropower turbo-generators with a generating capacity of 700,000 kWh each, a fivetier ship lock and a shiplift.

During torrential rains in southern China this month, the dam helped control flooding by reducing water flow from 27,000 cubic meters per second to 8,000 cu m/s.

Authorities say the reduction stopped 3 billion cu m of water from reaching downstream and lowered water levels by up to 1.5 m.

The dam is owned by China Three Gorges Corp.

The country’s secondlargest hydropower station, the Xiluodu Dam in Yunnan province, started operations in July 2013. As of last year, it generated 160 billion kWh of electricity.