China’s State Council, or cabinet, has authorized the Three Gorges power plant to raise the water level of the reservoir to 156 metres after this year’s flood season.

Navigation delays are set to begin Sept. 15 at the Three Gorges dam, as construction work on the shiplock will reduce traffic to single file and significantly curtail the volume of freight that can pass through the dam in the next year.

Traffic at the Three Gorges dam shiplock slowed drastically Friday as year-long construction work began. Traffic can now move in only one direction, alternating every 24 hours.

HRIC has learned that intervention by the German media has resulted in injured Three Gorges activist Fu Xiancai gaining admittance to one of China’s best rehabilitation hospitals. Meanwhile, local officials are harassing his friends and family.

The water level in the Three Gorges reservoir will rise from the current 135 metres to 148 metres by Oct. 1 and then to 156 metres by mid-October after a break of two days so engineers can monitor the effects on the dam, Xinhua reports.

The Three Gorges reservoir will be raised a maximum of five metres a day so that drought-fighting efforts and water usage in downstream areas are not affected, Xinhua reports.

Rising water levels in the Three Gorges reservoir will increase the amount of garbage floating around the dam, harming the environment and threatening river traffic, an official with the China Yangtze River Three Gorges Project Development Corporation said yesterday.

As the water in the reservoir is set to rise to increase the hydroelectric potential of the dam, a lot of garbage on the banks will end up floating in its huge reservoir, a top Three Gorges Corp. official says.

The Three Gorges dam will be thoroughly tested by the elements during next summer’s flood season, when it will have to hold back water up to 170 metres deep.