To face the most severe water crises, China has begun exploring technological options such as human intervention to induce rain. genetic modification of food crops, The largest water transport network will carry billions of cubic meters from the north to the south of the country.
For millions around the world, Drought has become a constant reality and an imminent danger that climate change contributes to its severity, High temperatures affect rainfall and snowfall, It depletes air moisture and irrigates the soil, turning it into water vapor in the atmosphere, Paradoxically, it caused heavy rains and floods elsewhere.
According to the China Meteorological Department, The summer of 2020 carried the longest heat waves ever recorded, Since the government established the weather records in the sixties of the last century, No heat wave has ever lasted more than two months, This high temperature was accompanied by stark variation in rainfall. While the south of the country saw a 60% decline, The northern regions suffered devastating floods due to heavy rainfall, As the southern Yangtze River recedes, The record of his northern counterpart, "Liao", The highest level since the early sixties.
generally China's annual climate change study shows a steady increase in these two phenomena. This will not only lead to flooding in some areas and drying up water bodies in others. It will disrupt the ecosystem, affect the generation of electricity from dams and change people's lives. Drying rivers are a source of livelihood for the communities that grew up on their banks. Depriving them obliges the government to develop relief plans and economic alternatives.
Given the momentum of China's economic activity, which feeds the entire world, The massive population of 1.4 billion, Quick and smart solutions are needed beyond traditional water conservation policies. Therefore, China knocked on the technical door, Several programs targeting multiple regions of the country have been developed. In Sichuan Province, for example, The local meteorological departments and the National Administration's Weather Modification Center collaborated with China Aerospace Industry Corporation to launch rain enhancement projects. It is a technology for adjusting the weather, They improve the ability of clouds to produce rain or snow or mitigate the phenomenon of cold.
This idea was born in the forties of the twentieth century, China has successfully developed the world's largest rain enhancement program, using small-sized devices with a rocket-like design that carry a chemical compound called silver iodide in the form of small sticks, each the size of an index finger. This compound induces clouds and forms ice crystals or ice flakes, Sensors monitor air quality.
In areas of limited cloud cover, The government has resorted to other alternatives that try to exploit the difference in weather between the two halves of the country to its advantage. The first example of this is the South-North water diversion project through a network of canals and tunnels that will cost the Chinese government $62 billion. It will cover about 20,000 kilometers.
For a decade, The first phase of the project will continue, It will spend $9 billion to dig a tunnel spanning 1,400 kilometers. It is the distance that the water will travel from the "Three Corridors Dam" to the capital, Beijing, The tunnel will not carry water directly to the city's reservoirs, but to the lower reservoirs of the Han River, One of the main tributaries of the Yangtze River, From there you will head north across the middle line of the water diversion project. The researchers plan to divert meltwater from the Tibetan Plateau into desert areas.
Pending the completion of these projects and irrigation of the cracked fields, The Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences seeks to enhance food security by developing drought-resistant crops such as soy seeds, wheat, rice and other genetically modified foods. 11 food species were approved to be modified with a range of traits such as pest resistance and drought tolerance.
But none of these innovative solutions will stand in the way of climate change, which is intensifying every year. More comprehensive approaches are therefore needed to target the root of the problem.
Digging a water network covering the whole of China is also a very difficult task. These tunnels will pass through one of the most difficult terrain structures in the world, They are full of cracks, rock pressure, floods and geothermal that even mechanisms cannot tolerate. China is counting on revolutionary engineering innovations to find solutions to all these challenges.
On the other hand, Rain enhancement technology is governed by many factors such as separation and weather conditions, They cannot be used unless there is a withdrawal in the first place, Chinese scientists remain puzzled about its true effectiveness. There is no way to measure the amount of rain that would have fallen naturally without human intervention. In other words, It is not possible to ensure that the technique increases rainfall in light of the inability to compare its performance with the normal situation, Although it has proven effective in increasing rainfall rates in Sichuan province compared to the last rates recorded before the start of rain operations, Researchers have found that it could achieve a 20% increase if it targeted winter clouds in a mountainous area.
The figures also indicate that the water diversion project transported 54 billion cubic meters of water and fed 140 million people in 8 years.
Infrastructure will contribute to raising China's annual food production from 660 to 1200 million tons per year. It removes the burden of importing nearly 100 million tonnes of grain, It prepares them for the harshest conditions that climate change may bring.
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