What’s new: China will invest 100 billion yuan ($15.2 billion) to reinforce reservoirs across the country over the next five years to enhance China’s flood prevention capabilities, the Ministry of Water Resources announced Monday.
China has more than 98,000 reservoirs in total, and the ministry has been strengthening those deemed unsafe for over a decade. Some 66,000 have been reinforced, with 16,000 left to go, the Xinhua News Agency reported last year.
The background: This summer South China experienced some of its worst flooding since 1998, and the reservoirs were vital in preventing it from being even more severe. However, the flooding also served to highlight the need to step up efforts to improve unsafe reservoirs. Ruan Limin, director of the department of operation management at the Ministry of Water Resources, said at Monday’s press conference that the safety of reservoirs in China has been greatly improved after rounds of reinforcement projects led by the state.
In the last 20 years, the dam failure rate in China has stood at 0.45%, lower than the world-recognized low dam’s failure rate of 1%, and in general a condition that is thought to be manageable.
Contact editor Marcus Ryder (marcusryder@caixin.com)
