The Engineering Marvel That China Hopes Will Help Wean It Off Foreign Energy (wsj.com)
- Reference: 0178642860
- News link: https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/08/11/1440231/the-engineering-marvel-that-china-hopes-will-help-wean-it-off-foreign-energy
- Source link: https://www.wsj.com/world/china/the-engineering-marvel-that-china-hopes-will-help-wean-it-off-foreign-energy-f8f91e92
[1] https://www.wsj.com/world/china/the-engineering-marvel-that-china-hopes-will-help-wean-it-off-foreign-energy-f8f91e92
So ... (Score:1)
... they have finally caught up with [1]Snoqualmie Falls [wikipedia.org].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snoqualmie_Falls_Hydroelectric_Plant
Re: (Score:2)
I have to assume that's a joke, 'cause this new dam is a little more than 1000 times the generating capacity... (60 gigawatts vs. 54 megawatts)
=Smidge=
Re: (Score:3)
Are you joking? That project is basically a soda straw - it produces 50 megawatts of power. The Chinese project, if successful, would produce around 30 gigawatts. It’s nearly a thousand times larger. Ive got plenty of disagreements with the Chinese system, and they have a Russia-like fixation on mega projects, but we should all be cheering for this one. Every gigawatt of renewable power we install means one less mountain of carbon we dump into the atmosphere. Every year.
Re: (Score:2)
The fact that it is not creating a lake and flooding any ecosystems, and is not holding up water needed for use by other nations down-stream, are huge pluses also. Its main impact on the natural environment from the water diversion looks like to shut down extremely remote water falls and rapids that are so remote that few people have ever seen them.
Non-paywalled link (Score:3)
Here's a link from [1]the BBC story about this project [bbc.com]. India and Bangladesh, who are downstream, are unsurprisingly less thrilled.
[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gk1251w14o
Re: (Score:2)
I'd be extremely concerned if I was India. This kind of thing also happens in other regions of the world. Mexico is also concerned about the Colorado Rivers throughput by the time it reaches them. Ethiopia has a large dam project as well and Egypt and Sudan are quite concerned for the exact same reasons.
Non-Pay-Walled Source of Information (Score:2)
[1]Right here. [hindustantimes.com]
Interesting the largest water wall of this river (longest in Tibet, fifth longest in China) was photographed for the first time in 1987. It required a helicopter to do it. That is what I call remote and inaccessible.
[1] https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/china-to-build-a-super-dam-on-its-part-of-brahmaputra-river/story-i4No1OJ9JuxMEJEwCtNrTO.html
More important is to wean off coal (Score:2)
More important is to wean off of coal, which they massively mine domestically and import to support their lowest cost energy policy.
Displace the dirtiest energy source first, coal, in both its domestic and imported forms.
Then do the same for oil, then do the same for natural gas. Order things by the pollution generated. Not by foreign vs domestic. Not by price.
Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander. (Score:1)
How does the USA compare? A bit of web searching got me this: [1]https://www.eia.gov/todayinene... [eia.gov]
According to the US EIA imports made up 17% of U.S. energy supply in 2024, the lowest share in nearly 40 years. That's good right? If China is seeking energy independence then should not every other nation also seek energy independence?
While China is seeking energy independence I'm seeing this considered a bad thing for nations of Europe. There's a certain segment of the population want Europe to run undersea
[1] https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=65664
Let's hope (Score:3)
...that they do [1]a better job than last time [wikipedia.org].
China can and does produce some of the best work in the world these days... but they only bother to put in the effort if someone is looking over their shoulder the whole time. If they think they can get away with it, they will cut every corner imaginable. This being a prestige government project it will probably get the oversight it needs to not be a disaster... probably.
=Smidge=
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Banqiao_Dam_failure
Re: (Score:2)
I think after 50 years they will do better. The issue is that with climate change causing droughts I wouldn't be surprised if they don't have the same problems Venezuela has where the River just cannot drive the turbines enough.
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A risk besides climate change is war with Taiwan. During war, Taiwan may use cruises missile to take out dams. They would probably focus on military targets at first, but if and when civilians in Taiwan get whacked, then the kid gloves are off.
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> I think after 50 years they will do better. The issue is that with climate change causing droughts I wouldn't be surprised if they don't have the same problems Venezuela has where the River just cannot drive the turbines enough.
To be fair, "mistakes" during construction and lack of proper maintenance are a big cause of the problem in Venezuela. Those factors would be bad enough, but drought surely adds to the problems.