A 6.0-magnitude earthquake struck Sichuan province in southwest China late Monday night, followed by a series of aftershocks measuring over magnitude 5.0 reports China’s official Xinhua news agency. Historical data indicates the event is an unprecedented one for the area.
Two of the most populous nations—China and India—are building hundreds of dams in a violently active geologic zone.
A massive landslide this week is only the latest natural disaster critics believe the Three Gorges Dam has caused—even officials admit there have been 70% more landslides and bank collapses in the dam’s reservoir area since it was built 12 years ago. Lily Kuo for Quartz reports.
Projects are strong enough to withstand a rare “thousand year” earthquake, say China Three Gorges Corporation officials: “no need to worry”. Experts beg to differ.
Increasing demand for natural catastrophe insurance has provided the world’s largest reinsurer, Munich Re, with its biggest market in the Asia Pacific region: China. But how will Munich Re classify disasters, such as earthquakes, in a country where seismic events are a growing subject of debate as to how many are natural and how many are man-made?
Another major earthquake has struck China’s Yunnan Province. Close to the epicenter of the earthquake are a number of hydropower dams. We asked Chinese geologist Fan Xiao: “Is there a link?”
Is China’s hydropower safe? Bloomberg’s Adam Minter cites Probe International’s investigations into the link between China’s dam-building and the surge in earthquakes.
Geologists predict more frequent catastrophes in China’s Three Gorges Dam region, after landslides wipe out a hydropower plant. Fan Xiao and Yang Yong, the authors of several reports for Probe International, speak to thethirdpole.net about a disaster-prone region made more perilous by intensive hydropower development and call for new risk assessments to be carried out.
Analysis of rough data by Chinese geologist Fan Xiao, cited by the prominent scientific journal Nature, connects heightened seismic activity to August’s Ludian earthquake.
If the findings of Chinese geologist and environmentalist Fan Xiao – and the author of several reports for Probe International – are accurate, they raise a serious question. This report by Quartz, a business news site from Atlantic Media, looks at some recent quakes in China linked to the filling of hydro-dam reservoirs.
(April 9, 2014) Another earthquake has struck China’s seismically hazardous southwestern region in the same vicinity as one of the country’s mega-dams. Chinese geologist and environmentalist Fan Xiao says there is a “high probability” the Xiluodu dam, China’s second and the world’s third biggest hydropower power plant, triggered the quake.
(February 3, 2014) Chinese geologist Fan Xiao investigates once again if the impoundment of a large dam reservoir triggered a series of earthquakes in the seismically active southwest region of China? Based on data collected by China Seismic Information (CSI), Mr. Fan says, ‘Yes’. Not only were the November 22, 2013, seismic events recorded in Sichuan, China not naturally occurring or isolated incidents, he says the region should prepare for stronger, “even destructive earthquakes” as a result of further impoundment.
(January 17, 2014) Haiti’s post-earthquake disaster housing projects are either empty and looted, or taken over by squatters and people unaffected by the 2010 earthquake. Why? “There is a void…there is no authority there.”
(April 30, 2013) Nature magazine reports that, while scientists agree that China’s deadly tremor at Ya’an (Lushan county) may hint at where future quakes will strike, they disagree on which seismic fault the next rupture is likely to occur.
(April 21, 2013) The strong earthquake that struck China’s mountainous Sichuan province Saturday morning may have been an aftershock, says prominent Chinese geologist, Fan Xiao. The accumulation of stress had not yet been fully released, making this region a more dangerous area after the May 2008 Wenchuan earthquake.
Patricia Adams
Brady Yauch
Dai Qing
Fan Xiao
Lawrence Solomon
Mu Lan
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