It is known there is only one Yellow River in China since antiquity. But the country is going to build three Yellow Rivers, one original, one model and one digital. The Three Yellow River Project will promote the modernization of the Yellow River's development and management so that in the future its embankment will not collapse, its water flow will not be interrupted, its riverbed will not rise and its water quality will reach the standard.

According to Li Guoying, director of the Yellow River Water Conservancy Committee, the digital Yellow River and the model Yellow River will be built to serve the water conservancy programs of the real Yellow River. Information collected through high technologies, including GPS, geographic information system and satellite remote control will be transmitted to the computer through optical fibers, microwaves and satellites. Based on its analysis of the data, the computer will work out a plan for the river's water conservancy projects. Then, the deign will be practiced on the model Yellow River before it is actually carried out on the real river.

Speaking at the National Water Conservancy Conference attended by directors of relevant government departments recently, Li said the research on the original Yellow River will provide various information and physical parameters to the development and management of the Yellow River. The interaction of the "three Yellow Rivers" will insure development plans for the Yellow River to be advanced, economic, rational, safe and efficient. The digital river-control system will help obtain an integral and systematic knowledge about the Yellow River and promote researches on the river. It will greatly raise the efficiency of decision-making and avoid faulty decisions.

Currently, the first stage of the project -- the water-quantity control system of the digital Yellow River has been finished. The water diversion gates in the lower reaches of the Yellow River are now controlled at four levels of authorities, from the Yellow River Conservancy Committee to relevant departments in each province, at the city and county level, and the sites. The general dispatch center of the Yellow River Conservancy Committee is able to conduct remote control on the culvert and sluice gates of the Yellow River 1,000 km away. The first digital hydrological station and two automatic high sand water-quality monitoring stations have been set up and put into operation. The design of the model Yellow River has been completed and construction will start soon.

(China.org.cn by Wang Qian, January 18, 2003)