Beijing will gradually shut down all individually-dug wells both
legal and illegal ones from 2008 in order to avoid polluted
drinking water and secure a safe supply for residents, reported
Beijing News recently.
Statistics show Beijing has more than 40,000 wells, providing
2.5 billion cubic meters of water, or three quarters of the
capital's annual water supply, the rest of it obtained from water
companies.
Most of the wells are located in the suburbs rather than the
city center. Legal individually-dug wells are sponsored by
industrial enterprises and local governments in some rural areas.
Originally the water from the wells was mainly used for irrigation
and industrial purposes. But later on, with no official approval,
local residents began to drink the water.
The capital city's efforts to control the water supply from the
wells came after some illegal wells posed a potential threat to
public health.
They account for about half of the individually-dug wells in the
city, starting up with no legal approval and avoiding annual
water-testing fees.
Recently, hundreds of local people were affected by drinking
water from illegally-built wells. Last month more than 50 residents
in Tongzhou District were hospitalized after drinking unsafe water.
On August 31 more than 500 people in Haidian District vomited and
had fevers after drinking polluted water from the community
well.
"With the completion of the South-to-North Water Diversion
Project in 2008, the city will gradually close the wells down," Dai
Yuhua, the director of water resources management at the Beijing
Water Affairs Bureau told China Daily. The project is
expected to relieve the water shortage in the capital.
In order to search for illegal wells, health departments in
Beijing have been using GPS systems and local authorities have also
conducted surprise inspections.
Meanwhile, the Beijing Tap Water Company has been extending its
water pipelines to solve rural residents' drinking water
shortage.
(China Daily October 11, 2006)