(September 10, 2002) China announces that construction will start soon on the Xiluodu dam upstream of the Three Gorges project.

China Three Gorges Project Corporation (CTGPC) will build a 12.6 million kilowatt hydropower station, the second largest in the country by capacity, on the Jinshajiang River, China Industry News reported on Wednesday.

The giant power station will be located in the Xiluodu Gorge on the border between Yongshan county in Yunnan province and Leibo county in Sichuan province, 1,780 kilometers away from Shanghai. It is the first stage of China’s Jinshajiang River waterpower development program.

CTGPC will build eighteen 700,000kw hydroelectric generating sets for the Xiluodu power station. Annual electricity output will reach 57.12 billion kilowatt-hours on average.

The company has already evacuated and resettled more than 7,000 people for the project. Construction will start soon.

China’s largest hydropower station is the ongoing Three Gorges Project on the Yangtze River. The project will have a total generating capacity of 18.2 million kilowatts.

China Energy Daily News, September 10, 2002