China’s problematic solution to its water-security woes

Recommendable! Very serious stuff! Wars have been fought over water! China, a giant on clay feet/Achilles heel? What about desalination?

"Beijing has long understood that China has a water-security problem that could pose an existential threat. ... Former premier Wen Jiabao observed that water shortages threaten ‘the very survival of the Chinese nation’.

China has 20% of the world’s population but only 7% of its fresh water. And 80% of China’s water is in the south, whereas half of its population and two-thirds of its farmland are in the north. While total water usage in China increased by only 35% between 1980 and 2010, water usage in households increased elevenfold and in industrial sectors, threefold. But per capita available water in China amounts to only a quarter of the world average. ...
A three-year survey of its river system completed by Beijing in 2013 indicated that the number of rivers in China had decreased by 28,000 from previous estimates. The flow of the Yellow River, which provides water to a significant proportion of China’s population, is a tenth of what it was 80 years ago. In addition, groundwater aquifers, critically important to northern parts of China, are being depleted at a rate of 1 to 3 metres a year. A 2015 study of the country’s groundwater found that 80% was contaminated by toxic metals and other pollutants, rendering supply unfit for human consumption. ...
Given this context, Beijing’s announcement late last year that it was moving ahead with plans to construct the world’s largest hydropower dam at Motuo on the Yarlung Tsangpo river ...

The new dam, one of at least eleven to be constructed along the Yarlung Tsangpo, ... When complete, it will generate up to 60 gigawatts of electricity. Nevertheless, China’s decision to proceed with the project now is curious for two reasons.

First, analysts see such projects as unfeasible given the prohibitive costs associated with dam-building in the region and with the transmission network that would be required to get the electricity to distant population centres.

Second, existing installed hydropower already far outstrips demand in China and Southeast Asia. ...

Beijing’s decision to proceed with the dam makes more sense in light of the likelihood of its being integrated into China’s South–North Water Transfer Project. This project is designed to resolve the water shortage problem in China’s north by moving water through 1,500-kilometre-long canals.

The completed eastern and middle routes of the transfer project can transfer 20.9 billion cubic metres of water each year. In 2018, Beijing started exploring options for the controversial western route of this project. This may result in tens of millions of cubic metres of water being diverted from the Yarlung Tsangpo and other transnational river systems in Tibet to the Yellow River. ...

The consequences of the new dam for downstream countries like India and Bangladesh could prove catastrophic. The Yarlung Tsangpo is a transnational river system that becomes the Brahmaputra River in India, which provides 30% of the country’s water. The project could reduce water flows to India by 60%.

The environmental impacts in Tibet and downstream will be devastating. ... could devastate the fragile ecosystem of the Tibetan plateau, and would withhold the river’s sediments from the fertile floodplains of Assam in north-east India, and Bangladesh.’ ...
China controls the sources of 10 major rivers that flow through 11 countries and supply 1.6 billion people with water. ... "

China’s problematic solution to its water-security woes | The Strategist