CHINAEUROPE AFRICAASIA 中文双语Français
Business\Companies

Construction of world's second largest hydropower station begins

Xinhua | Updated: 2017-08-04 10:00

WUHAN — Building work on what will be the world's second largest hydropower station started Thursday.

The Baihetan project is on the Jinsha River, the upper section of the Yangtze, straddling Sichuan and Yunnan provinces.

With a total installed capacity of 16 million kilowatts, the project is expected to generate more than 60 billion kilowatt hours of electricity per year, equal to about two-thirds of Beijing's electricity consumption in 2015.

The power will be generated in 2021 and the plant fully operational by the end of 2022.

With a 300-meter-high dam, the project can manage a basin area of 430,000 square kilometers, 91 percent of the Jinsha River's basin area.

Nearly 100,000 residents in Sichuan and Yunnan will be relocated to make way for the project.

Baihetan, one of four hydropower stations in the lower reaches of the Jinsha River, is downstream of the Wudongde plant that is under construction.

Xiluodu and Xiangjiaba started operations in 2013 and 2012 respectively.

With a combined installed capacity of more than 46 million kW, the four projects can generate 190 billion kWh each year, doubles that of the Three Gorges, the world's largest hydropower project.

Baihetan is significant in development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt and adjustment of China's energy structure, according to Lu Chun, chairman of the China Three Gorges Corporation.

The new project will be equivalent to nearly 20 million metric tons of standard coal, cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 52 million tons per year, according to Lu.

BACK TO THE TOP
Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site.
License for publishing multimedia online 0108263

Registration Number: 130349
FOLLOW US