One of the world's largest long-distance electricity transmission
system started to deliver power on Saturday in a milestone step to
link the Three Gorges power plant to the dam project's eastern
markets in and around Shanghai.
The US$600 million transmission line begins in Longquan, about 60
kilometers from the Three Gorges dam in Central China's Hubei
Province. It ends at Changzhou in East China's Jiangsu Province, 80
kilometers northwest of Shanghai. Its total length is 860
kilometers.
The 500-kilovolt direct-current transmission line carries
electricity from Central China's power grids to East China. It will
hook up to the power plant of the Three Gorges when it starts to
generate electricity next August.
Built on a 2,000-meter dam on the middle reaches of the Yangtze
River, the power plant forms one of the world's largest hydropower
projects. The project aims to build 26 generators with a total
capacity of 18,200 megawatts by 2009.
The first four generators have a combined capacity of 2.8 million
kilowatts and are due on stream next August. They will be able to
produce 5 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity next year. Half of
them will be sent to East China through the link to Changzhou,
while the rest will be distributed to Central China.
Zhao Xizheng -- deputy general manager of the State Power Corp of
China, which laid the transmission line -- said: "Today, with the
operation of the link, we can now ensure that we are fully capable
of transmitting the electricity from the Three Gorges, to link it
to power grids, and finally deliver it to end users."
He
said the company is constructing a dual transmission line to
accompany the Changzhou link. When completed in May, the total
capacity of the lines will be doubled to 3,000 megawatts.
Thus, the Changzhou link will more than triple the amount of power
currently delivered from Central China to the east coast, from
1,200 megawatts to 4,200 megawatts.
Zhao said the establishment of the Three Gorges-Changzhou link
means the completion of 80 percent of facilities to transmit
electricity from the first batch of generators.
The construction of transmission lines accounts for a quarter of
the total US$22 billion investment in the Three Gorges project. The
rest is for the construction of the dam and power plant and the
relocation of residents living near the site.
Company officials insisted that the project makes sense
economically, despite the relative power glut in East China.
Li
Yong'an, deputy general manager of the China Yangtze River Three
Gorges Project Development Corp, said last month that electricity
from the Three Gorges sold to the power grid will be priced at 0.25
yuan (3.04 US cents) per kilowatt-hour, compared with an average
price of 0.38 yuan (4.6 US cents) in Shanghai and 0.35 yuan (4.2 US
cents) for the whole of the East China region.
The price is also cheaper than the national average of 0.29 yuan
(3.5 US cents), Li said.
When all the power-generating units start generating electricity by
2009, 40 percent of the electricity will be sold to East China, 44
percent to Central China, and the remaining 16 percent to South
China's Guangdong Province.
(China Daily December 23, 2002)