Storage Capacity -----------------------------Flood Control Storage ------------------------------Navigation -------------------------------------------Power GenerationInstalled capacity -----------------------------------Unit Capacity ----------------------------------------InundationLand --------------------------------------------------Arable Land -----------------------------------------Population ------------------------------------------- 185 m2,000 m175 m145 m39.3 billion cubic meters22.1 billion cubic metersReservoir level raised 10-100m to allow for movement of 10,000 ton ships17,680 MW26 units, 68MW each632 km long, 19 cities, 326 towns30,000 hectares1,130,000 hectares
             Map 1: Location of the three Gorges dam.(Shui Fu)
             History of the Three Gorges Dam : The "On and Off" Project
             The idea of building a large dam across the Yangtze River had been around since the early 1900's. Dr. Sun Yatsen, founder of the People's Republic, first proposed building a dam on the Yangtze River in 1919 for power generation purposes, but the idea was shelved due to unfavorable political and economic conditions. Major floods resurrected the idea and the government adopted it in 1954 for flood control (Oksenberg and Lieberthal, 1992).
             According to Chinese scholars Kenneth Lieberthal and Michel Oksenberg,Vice minister of Electric Power Li Rui initially argued that the dam should be multipurpose and that smaller dams should be built first until China could afford such a costly project and that construction should proceed in stages to allow time to solve technical problems. Later, Li Rui concluded that the dam should not be built at all since it would be too costly. He added that the dam would also flood many cities and fertile farmland, subject the middle and lower reaches of the river to catastrophic flooding during construction and would not contribute much to shipping. Sichuan province officials also objected to the c...