Presenter
Dr. Bing Qiu, The General Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Planning and Design, Ministry of Water Resources
Sub-theme
5. Establishing Sustainable Water Infrastructures
Topic
5-2. Large inter-basin water diversion projects
Body
Water scarcity and the mismatch between water resource distribution and the layout of production forces are chronic water security problems in China. As a result, the development of the National Water Grid is accelerated in China to strengthen the national capacity of water resource allocation, water supply, and strategic water reserve. Inter-basin water diversion project, as an essential part of the National Water Grid to balance the spatial distribution of water resources, is one of the effective measures to tackle the issue of water scarcity in China. However, the inter-basin water diversion project is characterized by more ecological environment constraints, large project scale, and significant capital investment. Thus the reasonable determination of transferable water quantity becomes the fundamental premise for the feasibility demonstration of the inter-basin water diversion project. From the perspective of eco-technology-economy constraints, a model for calculating the transferable water quantity of the cross-basin water diversion project is established in this article. Firstly, ecological transferable water quantity is determined, considering that the upper limit of surface water resources exploitation is not broken, ecological flow is guaranteed, and the adverse environmental impact is acceptable. Secondly, considering the demand for water diversion and the design scale scheme of water transfer engineering, transferable water quantity under the combination of different water source engineering and storage scales and water diversion project scale is analyzed and calculated. Finally, considering the uncertainty in economic and social development, the economic rationality of project construction, and the uncertainty of dispatching and operation mode, and based on determining the ecological and technical transferable water quantity, the total scale unilateral water investment, the increased scale unilateral water investment, the difference unilateral water investment, and other indicators are adopted to carry out technical and economic analysis of different schemes of adjustable water quantity. Taking typical water transfer projects in southeast coastal areas of China as a case study, the model is verified and applied, which provides support for the formulation of a water resource allocation scheme.