Monday, November 06, 2000, updated at 18:03(GMT+8)
China
Longtan Hydropower Front-end Engineering Started
Last Friday saw Longtan Hydropower Station kicked off its right-side road construction in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomus Region.
The Station is located on the upper reaches of Honghe River in Guangxi. A key hydropower project on a scale next only to the Three-Gorges Project, with a designed installation capacity of 5,400,000 kw and RMB$28.3bn yuan to be used, "it is one of the ten large construction projects marking Western China development", said Zeng Peiyan, minister of the State Planning Commission.
The right-side road is to be built over 8.17km including a 340m tunnel to help start off construction of the whole project, dike and diversion culvert. All construction projects will be undertaken by top level construction teams through public bidding to ensure timely completion.
Construction will be launched on a full scale July next year. River damming is set by 2003 and power production is expected by 2007. The whole construction period is planned to be 10 years.