Water diversion has already begun for the Xiluodu Hydropower Station, the country’s second largest dam. And construction of Xiangjiaba Hydropower Station, the third biggest, got underway on November 26, Zhang Shuguang, deputy general engineer of China Three Gorges Project Corporation, told Shanghai Daily.

Plans for the third and fourth projects, Wudongde and Baihetan hydropower stations are still under consideration. The dams will lie along the lower reaches of the Jinshajiang River, the biggest tributary to the Yangtze between Yunnan and Sichuan provinces.

Construction of Xiangjiaba begins soon after China refuted foreign media reports that the Three Gorges dam is an environmental disaster. Pan Jiazheng, head of an expert panel for the Three Gorges Project, told a news conference in Beijing on November 27 that foreign reporters were “exaggerating” problems with the US$27.40 billion project, which has forced the relocation of 1.13 million people.