Gorges Dam

The Chinese government believes that construction of the Three Gorges Dam has helped produce solutions to the country's energy needs, and to flood control (of the Yangtze, the third largest river in the world). The arguments used by the Chinese as to flood control have some validity when a researcher realizes that over the past 2,000 years, there have been "200 catastrophic floods along the Yangtze's banks" (Watson, 2005). Also, because 70% of China's electricity comes from the burning of coal -- which causes choking smog in the big cities and contributes to the greenhouse gases that are causing climate change -- hydroelectric development seems like an alternative to coal-fired power plants.

Six Specific Risks with the Three Gorges Dam (TGD) in China

Meanwhile, what are six risks that the Chinese were willing to take when they built the dam? Certainly one is environmentally related, and Chinese scholars...
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