China and Big Things

[Knight-Dragon]

Originally posted by allhailIndia
If you compare the actual great empires and the "pretenders" you notice that the "great " empires never set out to build the **greatest** or the LARGEST things. They only did things with Perfection

I'd wouldn't call China a pretender nation, going by your implication. At least when China built some big stuff (Great Wall, Grand Canal), there's at least some rationale behind it.

 

[mcdh]

Originally posted by Groovin'



I dont think it is mainly a Communist policy, the Yanks were the same.... i think its more like, if another powerful country does something, we have have to do the same or better, it is always a game of one-upsmanship.... f***** stupid policy, instead of concentrating on their own countries peoples, they have to build / do something to make another superpower / country jealous.

If you knew a little bit about the three gorge dam, you wouldn't say it was a communist policy or result of a big country ego.

The idea of the Three Gorge Dam on the Yangtze River was first proposed by Dr. Sun Yen-tin in early 1900s. But obviously at that time, China couldn't afford to do such a big project. In the 1950s and 1960, Mao Tse-Tung seriously considered building the Dam again, but there were too many experts against such an idea, and Mao finally gave up.

In 1990s, with the new technology available, and the annul flood loss from the River got bigger and bigger, and China was facing big shortage of electricity powers, Beijing decided to take the risk and build the Dam. It's ture that until today, there were numerous critism on the Dam, but Dam was not a result of a communist policy or competition between big countries.

 

[The Art of War]

Originally posted by Sodak

All part of the population control policy. (just kidding, of course)

Probably more true than you or I know, Sodak. BTW, China is a communist country, is it not? How has it managed to survive with its strict sanctions and lack of women's rights?

 

[Richard III]

Originally posted by mcdh
In 1990s, with the new technology available, and the annul flood loss from the River got bigger and bigger, and China was facing big shortage of electricity powers, Beijing decided to take the risk and build the Dam. It's ture that until today, there were numerous critism on the Dam, but Dam was not a result of a communist policy or competition between big countries.

Strange, but where I come from, the government that actually DOES something is the government that's responsible for it, wherever the idea came from.

Which would make it a dam sponsored by the Communist Party of China, wouldn't it?

 

[mcdh]

Originally posted by Richard III

Which would make it a dam sponsored by the Communist Party of China, wouldn't it?

So? It's not true that Communist governments never make any good decisions, and it's not true that democratic governments always make good decisions.

I'm not defending three gorge dam, and I don't know whether building the Dam is a good decision or not, because I'm no expert in this field. However, it's wrong to label it as a communist policy, and then make it look wrong. And it has nothing to do with making the rest of world jealous.

 

[redtom]

I've studied this in AS Geography. The point of the dam is to:

>Flood control
>Provide electricity
>Political show-off

However there are many reasons for the dam to not be built:

>The huge amount loess (alluvial soil or silt) in the Yangtze River (hence its foreign name, Yellow River). The Yangtze carries the most amount of silt of all the rivers of the world. It will quickly fill up the dam reducing its ability to hold water also very quickly the loess fill clog the water turbines.
>The annual flood is extremely important for farming in the Yangtze River valley as the loess is extremely fertile.
>The loss of fishing due to loss of loess.
>The loss of farming will cause more people to buy expensive and polluting fertilisers to grow there crops-this will poison the Yangtze. Killing fish stocks.
>Stagnant water = malaria.
>Industrial sites flooded will poison stagnant water.
>Dam is on a earthquake zone - potential massive loss of life in Beijing.
>Millions of people will have to move and cause possible over crowding in a country already overpopulated.
>Stagnant water will carry many chemicals causing birth defects, infertility etc.

Anyway, the despite all these problems the Chinese are going ahead, so they must be either mad or extremely smart to know a way round all these problems.

 

[Zwelgje]

Originally posted by redtom
Anyway, the despite all these problems the Chinese are going ahead, so they must be either mad or extremely smart to know a way round all these problems.

I don't think they have got a solution for the problems you've summed up. It's just that they don't want to admit that they have made the wrong decision by building this dam and they will finish it. If anything goes wrong, well that's something to worry about when it actually happens.

 

[Knight-Dragon]

Originally posted by redtom
>The huge amount loess (alluvial soil or silt) in the Yangtze River (hence its foreign name, Yellow River). The Yangtze carries the most amount of silt of all the rivers of the world. It will quickly fill up the dam reducing its ability to hold water also very quickly the loess fill clog the water turbines.
>The annual flood is extremely important for farming in the Yangtze River valley as the loess is extremely fertile.

The Yellow River (Huanghe) and the Yangzi River are two different rivers. It's the Huanghe that's carrying a lot of loess, not the Yangzi. The dam will be built on the Yangzi.

I think the river that carries the most stuff shld be the Amazon though.

>Dam is on a earthquake zone - potential massive loss of life in Beijing.

The dam will be built somewhere downriver fr Sichuan, which is thousands of miles south of Beijing.

 

[Knight-Dragon]

Originally posted by redtom
>The loss of fishing due to loss of loess.
>The loss of farming will cause more people to buy expensive and polluting fertilisers to grow there crops-this will poison the Yangtze. Killing fish stocks.

River fishing has never been a really major Chinese economic activity. And I believe the Yangzi is already pretty much polluted as the Yangzi valley is one of the most rapidly industrializing part of the country; with or without the dam.

>Millions of people will have to move and cause possible over crowding in a country already overpopulated.

The dam is being built in an inland area, which is comparatively not as heavily populated as the coast. Better there than in Shanghai.

 

[Sodak]

Neutral scientific commentary:
Yes, the HuangHe is loaded with sediment, but K-D is right, the Amazon carries more. The Amazon is the mother of all rivers - greatest volume of water, heaviest sediment, widest. Not the longest, tho. IIRC, it is second to the Amazon in sediment load.

Redtom is right, tho, about effects of damming rivers. The loss of loess deposits lead directly to heavy fertilizer use by (formerly) alluvial farmers. Which is good for the chemical industry, drug companies (gotta cure all the new symptoms popping up), etc. Economically, a dam is a good investment. Ecologically, it is disastrous. Usually, the benefits claimed by the designers are real, but what is left unsaid would not please most people.

As for the turbines getting plugged, I imagine this would be addressed by the engineers. The Hoover dam is still working after all these years, despite blocking a sediment laden river.

 

[allhailIndia]

Just found out something new!!

A large mass of water on a small bit of land as created by the 3 Gorges Dam causes an earthquake by itself

It apparently happened in India in 1986 on the Koyna Dam when a small earthquake was magnified into a very damaging and devastating earth quake.

Anybody have some real facts on this???

 

[redtom]

I apologise about the Huange He - Yangtze mix-up.

I believe that clearing turbines of sediment is expensive to do. In relatively impoverished country even Poland had problems with its dams filling up with sediment.

Anyway, about the earthquake problem, has anyone head of the river in Italy, I think in the Aosta valley, that collapsed due to massive landslip caused by an earthquake?

I think it was the tallest in Europe at the time and a massive landslip (I think the engineers ignored the geologists advice) caused massive water to rush up causing increased pressure on the damn causing an almost tsunami like wave come crashing down the hillside.

 

[ComradeDavo]

I've studied this in AS Geography.

me to

China is a communist country, is it not?

well, we western left-wingers don't really think that much of China's so called 'communism'....

 

[mcdh]

Originally posted by redtom

I believe that clearing turbines of sediment is expensive to do. In relatively impoverished country even Poland had problems with its dams filling up with sediment.

So you think China's economy is as same large as Poland?

 

[redtom]

At the start of this thread it talked about massive things always come to grief. But I can think one engineering marvel that has survived the test of time the pyramids!

Pyramids are absolute huge, nobody knows quite how they were made. Ideas have ranged from a massive ramp (apparently for the largest pyramid it would have to be abou half a kilometre long for decent gradient), aliens, kites, unknown use of electromagnetics. All these are either stupid or impossible.

Also, if i can think of one modern wonder of the world it would be the Channel Tunnel. I've been through it 4 times it bloody amazing to think theres millions of gallons of water flowing above your head.

Also, I may sound stupid or mad, but has anyone heard of the Sumerians or possibly the Babylonians digging a tunnel below the Eurphrates River? I read it on some school hand out on the wonders of science and transport-yes it was boring apart from the tunnel thing.

It would be good if this could be some sort of wonder Civ II or III.

 

[allhailIndia]

Originally posted by redtom
At the start of this thread it talked about massive things always come to grief. But I can think one engineering marvel that has survived the test of time the pyramids!

Pyramids are absolute huge, nobody knows quite how they were made. Ideas have ranged from a massive ramp (apparently for the largest pyramid it would have to be abou half a kilometre long for decent gradient), aliens, kites, unknown use of electromagnetics. All these are either stupid or impossible.

Also, if i can think of one modern wonder of the world it would be the Channel Tunnel. I've been through it 4 times it bloody amazing to think theres millions of gallons of water flowing above your head.

Also, I may sound stupid or mad, but has anyone heard of the Sumerians or possibly the Babylonians digging a tunnel below the Eurphrates River? I read it on some school hand out on the wonders of science and transport-yes it was boring apart from the tunnel thing.

It would be good if this could be some sort of wonder Civ II or III.

Actually, the Pyramids were built as tombs, with an idea for imitating a nearby pyramidal mountain.

However, it was not without trial and error and there are several ruins of failed experiments in pyramid building, before they finally figured it out.

AS to how they built it, well it will be some time before archaelogy or exobiology(!!), study of alien life forms:alien:, can tell us the answer. Till then, I say thay had Superman do it for them