I chose to talk about the Three Gorges Dam in this week’s blog because I like engineering challenges, and this place represents one of the biggest engineering challenges since the Panama Channel was built, 100 years ago. Last week by searching around big engineering projects I found this one. I knew it existed, but I didn’t know how important it was. I did some research and I want to share with you guys some interesting facts I found about it.
The Three Gorges Dam is located in China and is consider one of the modern wonders of the world. It is the world’s largest hydroelectric power station and it took 10 years to be constructed. The construction began in 1996, and it was expected to take 19 years to be finished. The two main reasons why it was build were:
1. To control the flooding caused by the Yangtze River.
and
2. To generate electricity.
The idea of constructing a dam by the Yangtze River started in 1919. Engineers and scientist have been studying this idea since 1957, but with all of the economical, social and political problems in China during the last century. It was very hard for china to work in this project.
Today it is a reality. The dam is finished and the hydroelectric is working. The dam wall is about 2,335 meters long and 185 meters high. The project used 28,000,000 m^3 of concrete, 463,000 tons of steel, and moved about 134,000,000 m^3 of earth.
The construction began in 1994 and the first part was finished in 2003. After the hydroelectric began to work in 2003, the water level of the Yangtze River in the Three Gorges area raised more than 100 meters.
The Three gorges dam blew my mind and I hope it sparks interest in your minds as well.
If you would like to see videos about The Three Gorges Dam visit this links
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