What's in the desert? There are endless grains of yellow sand, and very occasionally a few vigorous shrubs or grasses; There are also animals that live in the desert all year round, but the only thing missing in the desert is water.
In the northeast of the Hexi Corridor in Gansu Province, there are two deserts, Badain Jarin and Tengger. On the Gobi Desert, which is surrounded by sand on three sides, there was an unexpected sparkling current.
It is a huge area, with yellow sand and green water intertwined, reflecting a shocking and rare picture. This is the Hongyashan Reservoir. It is the largest artificial reservoir in Asia, and what is even more amazing is that this project has been started in the last century, and it is a feat created by 240,000 people who have worked together for more than 40 years!
Hongyashan Reservoir
Of China's 9.6 million square kilometers of land, 1.65 million square kilometers are deserts alone, which are inaccessible and show few signs of life.
The Badain Jaran Desert is the fourth largest desert in the world, located in the western region of Inner Mongolia, covering an area of 47,000 square kilometers, and the Tengger Desert, also located in Inner Mongolia, covering an area of about 30,000 square kilometers, is one of the four major deserts in China.
At the junction of the two deserts is Qin County, Wuwei City, Gansu Province. Due to its proximity to the desert, the conditions in Minqin County are only slightly better than those in the desert. There is almost no vegetation here, and the saline-alkali land is also doomed to make it difficult for crops to survive, and at its worst, desertification and desertification land occupy 90% of the county's area, and was even considered the "second Lop Nur" at one time.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, in the face of the increasingly dangerous desert growth, in order to prevent the people of Minqin County from being forced to retreat by the desert, and in order to prevent the birth of the second Lop Nur, a bold idea emerged on the mainland - to build a reservoir in the desert.
After the reservoir was built, the people here no longer bothered about water; Nor will the two deserts continue to converge; Minqin County is likely to change its fate because of the reservoir.
However, another opposition has arisen. You know, the construction of reservoirs in the desert itself is like a fantasy, a major cause of desertification is the climate, if the climate does not change, even if the reservoir is built, it will not change anything at all, it will only cost people and money.
Besides, whether water can be stored in the desert is unknown, and if you do such a big project at one time, don't lose more than you gain in the end.
There were pros and cons to both opinions, and in order to resolve the dispute, the entire Minqin County held a big debate at that time, giving the reasons for repairing or not repairing, and finally came to the conclusion that it was built.
feat
After investigation, in 1958, the mainland officially opened the Hongyashan Reservoir project. At that time, there were no large machinery, no technology, and if you wanted to do it, you relied on manual labor.
Not only the laborers from all over the country, but even the people of Minqin County also picked up the guys and quickly joined the ranks of "digging ditches".
Little by little, in the face of huge projects, people's progress is as powerless as ants moving mountains. But at that time, people may have lacked food and clothing, and the only thing they lacked was unity.
I can't dig anymore, and my children, my children can't dig anymore, and my grandchildren, with this perseverance in front of me, the construction of the Hongyashan Reservoir has been gnawed down like this.
Before the advent of the new century, the Hongyashan Reservoir finally landed, with the participation of 240,000 people, and the water flow converged bit by bit, which finally created the feat of the Hongyashan Reservoir.
At the time, China's decision to build a reservoir in the desert was criticized by the international community, and the United States said it was environmentally damaging. But no amount of clamor will help, and the mainland is always moving towards the goal.
After the completion of the Hongyashan Reservoir, the people of Minqin County have water, crops grow in the ground, a wasteland has a rare green, and even attracted a large number of waterfowl to inhabit here.
At the beginning of the new century, although the reservoir developed very well, it did not take long for people to realize that the reservoir did not have enough water.
Expansion
There are more than 300,000 people living in Minqin, the water source of the reservoir comes from the Shiyang River, over the years, the amount of water entering the Shiyang River has been decreasing every year, the reservoir is not enough for the people of Minqin County to use, and even almost dried up, and the original Shiyang River has also been affected, once making the reservoir difficult to operate.
After realizing the problem, Gansu immediately took action to save the Shiyang River and Hongyashan Reservoir. To the east of the Hongyashan Reservoir is the Yellow River water, which has been injected into the reservoir every year since 2001 through multi-stage irrigation.
With the water of the Yellow River, the Hongyashan Reservoir is gradually full of vitality and its development has gradually become stronger. However, another problem also arises, the Hongyashan Reservoir was originally designed to have a maximum storage capacity of 99 million cubic meters, and over time, the sediment accumulation in the reservoir occupies a large amount of effective storage capacity.
In this regard, in 2016, the Hongyashan Reservoir was heightened and expanded, and the reservoir capacity was increased to the current 148 million.
Up to now, the completion of the Hongyashan Reservoir has become a great miracle in history, it is the only desert reservoir in Asia, and China is also the only country that dares to build a reservoir in the desert and operate it successfully.
After years of development, the existence of the Hongyashan Reservoir has successfully prevented the confluence of the Badain Jaran Desert and the Tengger Desert. Minqin County, which once almost became the second Lop Nur, is now also developing impressively.
effective
In 2010, the forest coverage rate of Minqin County was still 11.52%, and by 2019, the forest coverage rate of Minqin County had increased to 17.91%, and the desertification area had decreased, which also means that the reservoir was effective.
In terms of people's livelihood, the construction of the Hongyashan Reservoir has given hope to the local people, and Minqin County has used various technologies to adjust the local agricultural structure, so that the people's crops can blossom and bear fruit, and successfully realize profits.
At present, due to the effective regulation of local water resources, the total amount of water consumption has decreased year by year, and the benefits have also increased year by year.
Ecological environmental protection and the win-win situation of farmers, everything comes from the Hongyashan Reservoir.
There are more and more wild animals here, and there are more than 40,000 birds of more than 100 species that come to spend the winter. What used to be a barren area without water is now a wetland park.
Although a series of changes are illustrating the effectiveness of the Hongyashan Reservoir, we should not relax our vigilance, the risk of the two deserts merging still exists, the ecological risk has not been completely eliminated, the water source of the Hongyashan Reservoir still depends on the water diversion from the outer basin, how to solve the ecological water use from the root, it is worth thinking about.
Sources of information:
1. Chinanews.com-Shiyang River Basin "Sand Township" Gets a New Look: People Buy Range Rover and Ecological Economy "Win-Win"
2. Chinanews.com-Wuwei, Gansu: Asia's largest desert reservoir blocks sand and increases greenery
3. The largest desert reservoir in Asia has "borrowed" nearly 1.1 billion cubic meters of water from the Yellow River