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Answers From Dai Qing

November 21, 2007, 3:28 pm

Q:

Is the Chinese government underestimating the costs (environmental, social or otherwise) of these dams and overestimating the benefits from them? And if so, why? Is it possible that this New York Times article is overestimating the costs and underestimating the benefits of these dams to the overall Chinese society (even though these costs and benefits might not be evenly distributed within the Chinese society)? — Thanks very much, Anirban Pal

A:

It has become more and more clear: The Three Gorges Dam is a “fishing project.” That is to say, at the beginning they said the investment would be quite small, like a piece of bait. Later, once the project got started, they kept casting their line, asking for more. Anyway, all the money that was spent or wasted or lost to corruption — the whole burden has been shouldered by the authoritarian central government. There have been wrong estimates and wrong policies from the start, and no single individual is going to pay the price for that.

The budget was RMB 57 billion when the National People’s Congress approved the proposal in 1992. Now the total investment is claimed to be RMB 180 billion, and that’s not including 4 billion from the “Three Gorges Construction Fund” every year, 10 billion for the reservoir floor-cleaning project, 3 billion for cultural heritage protection, and at least 10 billion for landslide control in the reservoir area. None of the above was included in the original budget—not to mention the cost of the newly released plan to resettle another 4 million people.

Although “central government administrative funds” come from Chinese taxpayers, and although anyone who buys electricity has to contribute to the Three Gorges Construction Fund (0.5 –0.7 fen per kilowatt), how much has actually been spent on the project and how the money was really spent remain “top secret.”

As citizens, we need a clear answer. We are waiting that day we get one, and we are doing our best to make sure that day comes. Chinese taxpayers have the right to monitor where their money goes.

Q:

When we were in China last month, we found the air pollution quite extensive and understand it is caused in large part by the use of coal as a power source. However, when I asked the lecturer whether the hydroelectric power produced by the dam would cut back on the use of coal, I was told it would not. Is this true? — Mary Russell

A:

Hydropower is a clean form of energy that doesn’t pollute the air. However, if a dam is built on the middle reaches of a river busy with ship traffic; if it’s built in a densely populated agricultural region; on a river whose waters bear large volumes of sediment; in an area where the earth can split open and collapse at any time; in a place scattered with ancient tombs; in a place where rare animals and fish face extinction—then the contrast between the benefits brought by clean energy, and disasters brought by environmental damage and social turmoil, is quite clear.

What’s more, hydropower isn’t the only solution for clean energy. Besides wind power and solar power, the technique of “inferior coal and bio-waste mixture fuel” has also been put in use. This “mixture fuel” can be used in heating or refrigeration of any scale, including small-scale thermal power plants.

The need to protect rivers – not just use them — has become a universal consensus at the end of 20th century. Even the United States Army Corps of Engineers has started to focus on projects to preserve river ecosystems. They’re not in a rush to build dams anymore.

Mary, if during your trip to China you noticed air pollution in big cities, that’s caused by the exhaust from so many cars on the jammed roads—and that’s another issue

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