Waste threatens China’s Three Gorges Dam

Chinese efforts to battle floods across the vast country are being threatened by tonnes of waste caught in the Yangtze River and now on a collision course with a hydroelectric dam.


The Three Gorges Dam has, so far, limited the impact of devastating floods across the country.

But this morning (August 3) state-owned media is reporting layers of rubbish ‘thick enough to walk on’ is heading towards the dam.

The rubbish, which stretches for 12 acres, has formed as refuse has ended up in the river as floods swept across the country.

Now the Three Gorges Corporation, controllers of the dam, fear the vast swathes of rubbish could block the lock gates through which the water flows to power the dam.

Luke Walsh

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