【中文标题】荒芜的土地：中国的水资源危机 第三部分 － 中国在能源问题上进退两难
【原文标题】The Ruined Land: China's Water Crisis. PART 3: China in an energy quandary
【登载媒体】亚洲时报
【原文链接】http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/EH28Ad01.html
【译者】满仓
目前，中国是世界上仅次于美国的第二大固定发电量国家（2000年为338十亿瓦），但是它的人均用电总量只达到世界平均水平的38％。如果到2050年，中国的人口数量达到16亿，人均用电量达到世界平均水平，那么中国就需要每四年增加一个相当于加拿大全国的发电量。中国目前每年要烧掉10亿吨的煤来保证供应国家75％的能源，即使是最乐观的假设也会预计煤炭的消耗量会每年上升5％。
中国发布了雄心勃勃的计划来削减55％对煤炭的能源依赖。2030年，全国的能源消耗总量中，煤炭占62％、石油18％、天然气8％、水力9％、核能3％。到2050年，中国计划把煤炭消耗量降低到35％，石油和天然气占据主要的40％－50％，其余的核能、水力、太阳能和风能占据15％－20％。
为了实现提高水力能源的目标，同时为了把水资源调到中国因几个世纪以来的错误管理造成环境恶劣的地区，中国启动了历史上最大规模的水资源调整计划。8月14日，温家宝总理宣布今年会启动南水北调工程的东部和中部运河施工项目，这些运河会将三峡大坝的水资源引到数百公里以外的地方。这个项目中需要重点关注的问题之一，就是在将水资源从南方引到沙漠地区的时候，会减少中国北方的污染现象。如果这个计划失败，中国最好把首都从沙子堆里的北京迁出去。
官方新闻机构新华社报道，温说政府已经制定了保护水资源免受污染的计划。马上要启动的八个项目包括：从河北省石家庄到北京团城湖的一条运河、丹江口水库大坝的加固工程、在已经干涸了1000公里的长江下面修建一条隧道、在东部大运河沿岸城市建立污水处理厂。
温还说到2008年，在东部大运河沿岸将建立295个污水控制工程项目。东部大运河是南水北调的三条大运河之一，总长度1300公里，横跨中国东部、中部和西部。
国家环保总局（SEPA）承认东部大运河沿岸的水源污染问题依然令人担忧，SEPA所监控的所有7的地点都有不同程度的污染，政府将实施针对企业和个人的排污收费政策。仅仅在东部大运河工程上，政府就会投入240亿元人民币用来减少污染保护环境，这是建设大运河总投资的三分之一。
温说，南水北调工程在去年12月份正式开工，目标是把448亿立方米的长江水调到北方，这个项目的主要任务是为北京、天津和河北省北部提供紧急用水。
中国正在面临一个在水资源污染和大气污染间的选择。一个国际性的环境监察机构“世界观察研究所”预测，中国在未来十年会轻松超过美国，成为世界上最大的空气污染源。中国在1996年开采出14亿吨煤，其中的20％被烧掉，由此可推断出中国在当年向空气中排放了2370万吨的二氧化硫。
1999年，中国被监测的338个城市中，只有三分之一达到了国家的环境空气质量标准，而实际上中国的环境空气质量标准要比国际标准低很多。山西省会太原出产全国煤炭开采量的四分之一，那里的空气质量在世界上是最差的，经常是达到世界卫生组织标准的7倍。
世界银行的报告预测，空气污染每年让中国花费250亿美元在医疗卫生方面，并且因此损失了无数的劳动力。仅仅是室内烧煤取暖和烹饪造成的污染，每年就会造成中国70万名早产儿的死亡。整个中国来看，四分之一早期婴儿的死亡都于呼吸道疾病有关，这个数字在过去十年中上升了25％。每年有1万名矿工在矿难事故中丧生。
而且，中国40％的地方受到了酸雨的影响。在重庆，酸雨每年破坏150万吨煤矿资源，公共汽车的站牌由于受到酸雨侵蚀，必须每年更换。大城市的政府官员说酸雨让中国每年花费16亿元人民币。
在这些事实的前提下，中国在减少对煤炭依赖方面的任何努力都应该是受世界欢迎的。北京计划在2005年年底前禁止生产含硫量超过3％的煤炭。两个横贯大陆的煤气输送管道和数十个小型管道已经在建，这将为一些大城市输送清洁的取暖和烹饪能源。像北京和太原这样的很多大城市里，居民已经安装了新型的天然气锅炉，取代老式的煤炭锅炉。
中国还承诺清理工厂的烟囱，在2010年让二氧化硫的排放量减半。中国对陈旧和效率地下的工业技术的依赖，意味着为了获得和发达国家同样的能源量，中国每年必须多烧500万吨煤。460亿美元的大部分都在由日本来支付，它因山西空气污染而损失惨重，丰田公司甚至向山西工厂派驻了烟囱清理工。但是尽管付出了很多清理工作来减少对煤炭的依赖，它仍然是中国能源消耗的最主要原材料。到2030年，预计石油可以为中国提供18％的能源需求，中东石油对中国的意义和对日本、美国的意义一样重大，但是煤炭依然会占据主导地位。到2020年，中国依靠燃烧煤炭的工厂将会排放出1020万吨二氧化碳、15.2万吨二氧化硫和将近50万吨灰尘和废土。
有鉴于此，三峡大坝和其它的水力工程项目则大有裨益，它们将会贡献中国20％无污染的电力消耗量，比煤炭要好得多。但是，中国疯狂修建大坝和水库的行为依然不是一个明智的选择，而且不值得鼓励，因为这样的行为是以巨大的人类和环境牺牲为代价的。
过去50年来的水资源使用方案已经让人类付出了巨大的牺牲，这件事即使中国人自己也不知道。截止到1982年，中国已经强制驱逐了1020万人，来给7万座大坝和8万个水库让路，这个数字还有可能是比较保守的。在过去的20年间，又有300万人被迫离开自己的家园，让总数达到了130万人。
其实，修建大坝引起的重新安置仅仅是大规模迁徙活动的一小部分。在毛泽东时代，1.7亿人被迫在中国境内流动。士兵、囚犯、红卫兵和矿工们被发配到国家偏远的地区，如云南的森林中、陕西的群山中和前满洲里境内的峡谷中，2000多万“知识青年”从城市中被派往农村。另外1600万人被送往内地修建毛的“第三条防线”，这是一个散布在偏远地区的军事工业建筑群，确保他的政权不受苏联的核威胁和进攻。
从1949年开始，各种各样的基础建设项目让4500万人搬离了家园，这种大规模的迁徙行为所造成的一个结果是殖民化，曾经是猎人和牧民生活的地区变成了密集的安置地。比如黑龙江省的三江平原，地形完全被改变成农田，现在有800万人在这个地区生活。
原文：
China now ranks second globally to the United States in installed electricity capacity (338 gigawatts in 2000) but its use of electricity is just 38 percent of the world's average. If by 2050 its population peaks at 1.6 billion and per capita energy use reaches the world average, it will be adding the generating capacity of Canada every four years. China currently burns more than a billion tonnes of coal a year to produce 75 percent of its energy. Even the most optimistic assumptions foresee coal consumption growing by about 5 percent a year.
The country has unveiled ambitious plans to cut its reliance on coal to about 55 percent of its energy needs. By 2030 coal is expected to provide 62 percent, oil 18 percent, natural gas 8 percent, hydropower 9 percent, and nuclear power 3 percent of China's energy consumption. By 2050, Chinese planners believe coal consumption should be down to 35 percent of consumption, with oil and natural gas accounting for 40-50 percent and primary energy sources such as nuclear, hydro, solar and wind power accounting for 15-20 percent.
To attain that hydropower goal, and to deliver water to parts of China that are now suffering badly from the effects of centuries of mismanagement of the environment, the country has embarked on the biggest water-diversion plan in history. On August 14, Premier Wen Jiabao announced that work on the eastern and central canals of a south-north water-diversion project are to start this year. These canals would carry water from the Three Gorges Dam hundreds of kilometers away. One of the most important parts of the project is reducing water pollution in northern China, bringing water from the south to what is now a virtual desert. If the project fails, China might well have to move its capital from Beijing, which sits in the middle of a desert.
Wen was quoted by the official Xinhua News Agency as saying that plans are being made to protect the water from pollution along the diversion. Eight projects are soon to be initiated, including a canal from Shijiazhuang in Hebei province to Tuancheng Lake in Beijing, the reinforcement of the dam of Danjiangkou Reservoir, a tunnel under the Yellow River, which is now dry 1,000km from its mouth, and construction of sewage-treatment plants in cities along the eastern canal.
Wen said that by 2008, 295 water-pollution control projects will have been built along the east canal, one of three south-to-north water-diversion canals running about 1,300km across the eastern, middle and western parts of the country.
The State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) acknowledged that water pollution along the east canal is still worrisome. All seven spots that are monitored by SEPA were reported to be polluted in varying degrees. New rules to charge enterprises and residents for disposing of wastewater will also be adopted. On the east canal alone, 24 billion yuan (US$2.9 billion) will be invested in reducing pollution and protecting the environment, one-third of the budget for the canal.
The south-to-north water-diversion project formally started last December and aims to divert 44.8 billion cubic meters of water from the Yangtze to the north, Wen said. Emergency water supply to Beijing, Tianjin and north Hebei province will be a priority of the project, he said.
China is thus choosing between environmental hazard in its waters and environmental hazard in its air. The Worldwatch Institute, an international environmental watchdog, estimates that China is poised to overtake the United States as the world's largest source of air pollution within 10 years. Less than 20 percent of the 1.4 billion tonnes of coal that China mined in 1996 (when coal output peaked) was washed, so that 23.7 million tonnes of sulfur dioxide was discharged into the air that year.
In 1999, only a third of China's 338 monitored cities were in compliance with the nation's ambient-air-quality criteria - which are far lower than international standards. Taiyuan, the capital of Shanxi province, where a quarter of the country's coal is mined, has the worst air-pollution record of any city in the world, with particulate concentrations often seven times World Health Organization (WHO) standards.
A World Bank report estimates that air pollution costs the Chinese economy $25 billion a year in health expenditure and lost labor productivity alone. As many as 700,000 premature deaths per year are attributed just to indoor air pollution from burning coal for heating and cooking. Throughout China, respiratory diseases are blamed for a quarter of all early deaths, a figure that has increased by nearly 25 percent over the past decade. Then there are the 10,000 miners who lose their lives each year, largely from coal-face accidents.
Moreover, acid rain affects 40 percent of China. In Chongqing, which burns 15 million tonnes of coal each year, acid rain is so severe that bus signs have to be changed every few years. The municipal government says acid rain costs 1.6 billion yuan a year.
Given this story, anything that China does to cut its reliance on coal is to be welcomed. Beijing plans to ban production of coal containing more than 3 percent sulfur by the end of 2005. Moreover, two transcontinental gas pipelines and half a dozen smaller ones are being built that would supply the big cities with clean energy for heating and cooking. In many cities such as Beijing and Taiyuan, people are already installing new gas-fired boilers to replace coal-fired ones.
China is also promising to clean up its smokestacks and halve sulfur-dioxide emissions by 2010. The continuing reliance on old and inefficient industrial technology means that China must burn 50 million tonnes of coal more than a developed country for the same amount of energy. Much of the bill of $46 billion is being footed by Japan, which suffers from Shanxi air pollution. Hitachi is even providing smokestack scrubbers to Shanxi plants. But despite these attempts to clean it up and reduce dependence on it, coal will remain central to China's energy consumption. By 2030 oil is scheduled to supply 18 percent of China's needs - making it as important a consumer of Middle Eastern oil as Japan or the United States - yet coal consumption will remain the most pressing issue. By 2020, China's coal-fired generating plants will alone be emitting each 10.2 million tonnes of carbon dioxide, 152,000 tonnes of sulfur dioxide and nearly 500,000 tonnes of dust and fly ash.
So, on the face of it, the Three Gorges Dam and all the other hydropower schemes offer big benefits, which contribute 20 percent of China's electricity consumption from non-polluting energy that is vastly preferable to coal. Even so, the giant dams and reservoirs China is building at such a furious rate remain a poor investment and should be discouraged, because their construction entails big hidden human and environmental costs.
The past 50 years of water conservancy has been achieved at a gigantic cost in human suffering, which is little known even within China. By 1982 China had forcibly evicted 10.2 million people to make way for 70,000 dams and 80,000 reservoirs; even this may be an underestimate. In the past 20 years, an additional 3 million people have moved, bringing the total to 13 million.
Resettlement for dam building is, of course, only one part of a bigger story of forced movement. In the Mao Zedong era, 170 million people were shifted around the country. Soldiers, prisoners, Red Guards or miners were sent into hitherto remote areas such as the forests of Yunnan or the mountains and valleys of former Manchuria. More than 20 million "educated youth" were sent from the cities into the countryside. Another 16 million were sent into the interior to build Mao's "Third Line", a military-industrial complex scattered in remote locations to enable his regime to survive a Soviet nuclear attack and invasion.
Since 1949, 45 million people have been moved to make way for all kinds of infrastructure projects. One consequence of these population movements is a form of colonization. Areas that were once the domain of hunters and herdsmen have been transformed into densely occupied settlements. The Sanjiang Plain in Heilongjiang province, for instance, in the far north was drained to create farmland that now supports 8 million people. |
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发表于 2009-10-29 09:41
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发表于 2009-10-29 20:18
