The ongoing drought has depleted hydroelectric power generation to the point that Yunnan has temporarily stopped transmitting electricity to Guangdong province.

Yunnan's hydroelectric dams typically generate a surplus of electricity, which is sold to surrounding provinces and countries.

But this year during Chinese New Year, Guangdong actually donated 350 million kilowatt-hours of electricity to Yunnan, a role reversal for one of the larger consumers of Yunnan's hydroelectric power.

The dearth of precipitation in Yunnan since last year has caused hydroelectric stations across the province to run below capacity, while some are not operating at all, according to local media reports.

Overall, exports of Yunnan-generated electricity to Guangdong are down by 4.23 billion kilowatt-hours this year.

A government official familiar with the energy sector said that the government has made contingency plans that will force electricity-intensive industries to shut down if power supplies become too scarce.

Meteorologists are predicting that Yunnan will not receive significant amounts of precipitation until May at the earliest.

Crime boss invokes coal mining alibi
Alleged Kunming gang leader Shen Chao (沈超) started his criminal trial yesterday in a Kunming court along with 32 other members of his gang, according to a Kunming Information Hub report.

Shen stands accused of committing a number of serious crimes between 2006 and 2009, including organizing illegal gambling, leading a criminal gang, possession of an illegal firearm, and murder.

The story quotes Shen as denying the crimes by explaining that he was, "too busy investing in coal mines in Zhaotong to commit the crimes."

The trial is expected to conclude today.

Kunming bombards clouds with no result
Kunming meteorologists fired 40 cloud seeding rockets from March 9 to 10 in an attempt to draw rainfall from the clouds covering the city earlier this week.

A Kunming Information Hub article on the operation reports that a light drizzle did fall in some areas around the city, but that the maximum recorded rainfall was just 0.7 millimeters.

As Yunnan's worst drought on record intensifies, government officials are under increasing pressure to appear to be taking action to address the widespread water shortages, crop failures, and wildfires that have been a result of the drought.

According to the article, as of March 9, 3,326 rockets and 3,019 shells had been fired in cloud seeding operations in southwestern China. There has been no mention of what substances are being used, although silver iodide is widely used around the world.

Kunming has an average annual rainfall of 1,040 millimeters, but the total for 2009 was just 571 millimeters.

Water management official commits suicide
The drought in Yunnan appears to have claimed its first fatality – Chinese media is reporting that a water management official in Lufeng county jumped from his office window on March 3, apparently due to mounting work pressures.

In addition to dealing with the drought, Lufeng water management bureau director Li Jianrong (李建荣) was also coping with the aftermath of a magnitude 5.1 earthquake that struck the area on February 25.

Li's colleagues told reporters that he was facing enormous work pressure from addressing both the drought and the earthquake.

For the last decade, the elephant in the living room of China's relationships with the countries through which the Mekong River flows has been the growing number of dams built on and planned for the Lancang River – as the Mekong's headwaters in Yunnan are known.

The river - which in February was at half its normal level for that month - is a source of food and livelihood for the 65 million people living in its basin in Yunnan, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia.

On Monday, Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva met with Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Hu Zhengyue, telling Hu that residents of the lower Mekong region were concerned about the river's recent low water levels and were uneasy regarding the lack of clear information about China's dams on the Lancang, according to a Nation report.

Despite Abhisit's polite request for better information, Thai officials came to China's defense, saying that the recent low levels in the lower Mekong basin – the lowest in half a century – were primarily due to a drought in Laos. Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya said that rain in Laos normally accounts for 35 percent of the Mekong's water supply and that only four percent of the river's total water was held behind Chinese dams.

China currently has three dams operating on the Lancang, with a fourth at Xiaowan scheduled to commence operation in 2012. If completed, the Xiaowan hydropower station will be the world's tallest dam, rising almost 300 meters and capable of retaining 15 billion cubic meters of water.

Plans for a protest outside the Chinese embassy in Bangkok next month by residents of the northern Thai city of Chiang Rai suggest that residents of China's neighbors downstream may become increasingly vocal about the impact they feel Chinese dams are having on the river.

The Bangkok protest will be timed to coincide with the first Mekong River Summit, organized by the Mekong River Commission (MRC) and scheduled to be held in the Thai beach town of Hua Hin from April 2 to April 5.

The conference's theme, "Transboundary water resources management in a changing world" is slightly undermined by the fact that the MRC's membership only includes Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia, with Myanmar and China only participating as "dialogue partners".

It is difficult to imagine China making concessions to protestors, governments or anyone else for the time being. The Bangkok Post is reporting that a letter sent last month to Yunnan Governor Qin Guangrong by the Chiang Rai provincial government demanding the release of water from Lancang River dams was rebuked by Qin, who said the water was needed in Yunnan for agriculture during the dry season.

In addition to the protest related to the Mekong's current low levels, some Thai villagers will also attempt to deliver a petition to China seeking compensation for flooding in 2008:


In May 2009, the United Nations said China's plans to eventually build eight dams on the Lancang "may pose the single greatest threat to the river". China, however, is not the only country building dams on the river. Laos has plans for 23 dams on Mekong tributaries and the Mekong itself to be finished in the coming year, with Vietnam and Cambodia also planning dams of their own.

Lancang River image: news.china.com.cn

Yuxi fights fire with fire
Last week, firefighters in Yuxi used their "long-range intelligent forest fire extinguishing system" (远距智能森林灭火系统) for the first time, according to a Yunnan Info Daily report.

The system consists of a truck-mounted launcher that fires rockets filled with an unspecified fire-extinguishing substance. It is intended to keep firefighters out of harm's way and fight fires on steep hillsides that are difficult to access on foot.

According to the report, firefighters were initially planning on firing rockets at a mountaintop where a forest fire was encroaching on high-voltage power line towers, but were seemingly foiled because they were afraid of destroying the very power lines that they were trying to protect.

Several hours later in another area firefighters succeeded in firing ten rockets at a fire burning near a highway.

As Yunnan continues to suffer from the worst drought on record there have been a large number of forest fires across the province. Kunming alone reported 81 forest fires between November 10 of last year and February 7 of this year.

Cloud seeding in Yunnan
Kunming Information Hub is reporting that the rain and snow that fell last week across Shangri-La County, Deqin County and Weixi Lisu Nationality Autonomous County were artificially triggered.

During the drought, the Yunnan government has been occasionally claiming that snow and rain in the province were artificially triggered, but such claims are difficult to prove because the precipitation may have occurred anyway without human intervention.

CCTV has an interesting video of cloud seeding in action in Qujing.

Water shortage continues
Water is selling for 100 yuan a cubic meter, or 10 yuan a liter, in some parts of Yunnan according to an article in Kunming Information Hub.

Fear of water shortages has prompted the Qujing government to shut down businesses such as car washes and saunas that rely on intensive use of water. Additionally, Kunming has raised its fines for businesses discovered to be wasting water.

Images: Yunnan Info Daily (rocket), CCTV (cloud seeding)

Yunnan drought damage intensifying
The rain and snow that fell across northern Yunnan last week was not nearly enough to relieve the record drought that has left Yunnan with countless water shortages, forest fires, and failed crops. Government projections now have the drought lasting into early summer.

Estimates now stand at almost six million people and 3.6 million livestock in Yunnan lacking normal access to water—including 1.8 million people in the Kunming area alone—along with 2.5 million hectares of cropland affected. The number of people lacking normal access to drinking water could rise to nearly eight million in March without further rain.

The drought is now also affecting shipping traffic on the Mekong River.

After years of Chinese civil engineering projects such as dredging channels and blasting shoals, the upper Mekong River, known in Yunnan as the Lancang River, has become a major freight conduit between China, Laos, and Thailand, carrying oil shipments and other cargo up and down the river.

Reuters is reporting that the river is at half of its usual level for this time of year and China has halted the operation of 21 Chinese boats and stopped issuing border crossing permits to cargo boats seeking to enter China from the south.

Additionally, the drought has hit Yunnan and neighboring Guangxi's sugar farmers hard, leading to a 12 percent decrease in national sugar production for this growing season compared to last year. This development could drive up national prices if China begins to import more sugar.

Kunming apartment rents rising fast
If it seems that your landlord is trying to bleed you dry when you re-sign your lease this year, you might take consolation in the fact that other renters across Kunming are being similarly squeezed.

According to a Xinhua Net article, rental prices for small-sized family dwellings in the downtown area have increased by 10 to 15 percent in recent weeks as a surge of outside workers return to Kunming from Spring Festival vacations and a new crop of college graduates begins to flood the rental market.

The increase comes on the heels of rising prices last year.

Viewing China's stimulus package through Chenggong
A Financial Times article that appeared on Sunday used the example of Kunming's Chenggong new area to examine whether rapid development, China's economic stimulus package, and property speculation have caused a national property bubble.

The article focuses on the breakneck pace of residential construction in Chenggong, which for the moment is home to row upon row of mostly uninhabited apartment blocks and other buildings.

Kunming, however, has a rapidly growing population and very little space remaining around the original city center. With government offices and universities preparing to relocate there, it is difficult to imagine Chenggong remaining a ghost town for long.

Image: Sina News

Kunming and much of the rest of Yunnan have been enjoying idyllic cloudless days for most of the last five months, but the azure skies have concealed an increasingly dire issue: Yunnan is running out of water.

In November of last year, Kunming officials were asserting that should Kunming not receive any precipitation this winter, there would still be enough water in the city's reservoirs to provide the city with water until late spring 2010.

Fast-forward to today, and the government's no-need-to-worry tone has given way to grim statistics that underscore the severity of the current drought, the worst the province has seen in 60 years.

What's the damage looking like at this point? Nearly five million people are having difficulty accessing drinking water, forest fires are up 600 percent and hydropower generation has been halved. Estimates of drought-related agricultural losses are currently at 6.5 billion yuan (US$952 million).

Aside from Kunming, areas suffering most from the drought include Lincang, Pu'er, Jianshui, Yuxi, Chuxiong, Dali and Baoshan, where 300,000 people lack access to enough drinking water. The drought is also causing water prices to skyrocket. In Wenshan one cubic meter of drinking water is reportedly selling for as much as 100 yuan.

In some of Yunnan's more remote areas, villagers have to walk to other villages and towns up to 20 kilometers away in order to buy water at high prices, then carry the water home on their backs.

The provincial government has set aside 389 million yuan for drought relief, which will be allocated for distributing drinking water to the areas most in need and irrigating more than 700,000 of the 2 million hectares of crops affected by the drought.

Officials estimate that more than 500,000 hectares of crops have already been destroyed by lack of water. Yunnan is also expected to produce 40 percent less grain during this summer's growing season. Farmers are also struggling to provide water for 3.3 million large livestock.

To make matters worse, the drought is fueling an increase in forest fires before the rainy season begins in late spring. Firefighters around the province have battled about 59 blazes in the past five weeks, according to Xinhua Net, though most have been small enough to have been successfully extinguished in one day. There is now a jumbo helicopter stationed at Kunming Wujiaba International airport to assist in firefighting.

Several fires have burned in the areas around Kunming recently, including on Qipan Mountain to the west, forests near Shuanglong in the northeast, and Changchong Mountain in the north.

We followed up our recent bicycle trip to Chongchang Mountain with a visit to survey the fire damage over the weekend. Though the mountain retains its verdant, forested slopes and panoramic views of Kunming, it has lost some of its charm: the summit is a mass of rock and black charred grass and smells strongly of smoke.

The timing for the drought conditions couldn't be much worse, as Chinese New Year approaches and people around the province stock up on fireworks to set off in celebration of spring's arrival. In light of the drought and superdry conditions, the Kunming municipal government has shortened the 25-day fireworks sales season to 12 days, with sales ending February 19.

Update: Fireworks sales are now banned after February 16.

Crop image: CCTV

Airport "mafia" ring broken
Local media are reporting that police arrested five men yesterday who have been terrorizing vendors, tourist agents, and other solicitors since 2008 at the Kunming Airport in a mafia-style shakedown scheme.

Police stated that the gang's boss, surnamed Liu, and its other members were all from either Shandong province or northeast China. Their alleged criminal activities consisted primarily of threatening people offering services at the airport with physical violence if those people did not pay the gang a fee.

Police reportedly launched the investigation that led to Tuesday's arrests in late 2009 after receiving reports of "fierce thugs" roaming the airport. Police say that so far they know of at least 100,000 yuan in coerced payments that the gang collected last year.

Drought may affect electricity supply
In addition to threatening access to drinking water and damaging crops, Yunnan's record drought is now endangering the province's ability to generate sufficient levels of electricity.

According to a Xinhua Net report, Yunnan Power Grid Corporation president Liao Zelong predicts that low hydroelectric dam reservoirs will cause a 20 percent shortfall in the province's power generation capacity through the end of May, when the rainy season is expected to begin.

The problem has been compounded by breakdowns and coal shortages at coal-fired power plants.

It remains unclear whether electricity can be imported from surrounding provinces, or if any other measures can be taken to meet demand.

Pipelines to move oil and gas through Kunming
Reuters is reporting that two pipelines will be built to carry oil and gas from Myanmar into China through the Kunming area.

The first will be completed within the next two years and will carry up to 12 million metric tons of crude oil every year from the Myanmar port city of Kyauk Phyu, helping to streamline shipment of crude oil to China from Africa and the Middle East by going overland and avoiding the narrow Strait of Malacca between Malaysia and Indonesia.

A refinery with a capacity of 200 thousand barrels per day is being built in Kunming to process oil from this pipeline.

The other pipeline, with an unknown completion date, will carry up to 12 billion cubic meters of Myanmar natural gas into China every year. Spurs of both pipelines could eventually extend as far as Nanning and Chongqing.

While these projects would seem to strengthen Yunnan's position as an economic gateway to Southeast Asia, China and Myanmar's rocky relationship and Myanmar's history of political canniness signal that they are not without risks.

Photo: Kunming Information Hub

A pilot project using a type of invasive water hyacinth species to reverse the process of eutrophication that has led to large-scale algae outbreaks in Dianchi Lake will launch today at the lake's southern end.

A Kunming Information Hub story reported that the project will experiment with controlled growing of the prolific aquatic plant to filter nitrogen and phosphorus out of the lake and create a source of biomass that can be used as fertilizer or to produce methane gas for generating electricity.

Dianchi's water quality is currently ranked class V, meaning it is unfit for human consumption or even agricultural or industrial use.

So far 6.7 hectares of water hyacinth have been planted and a processing factory constructed near the southern end of Dianchi in Jinning County. The hyacinth growing area is slated to eventually grow to 67 hectares.

Water hyacinth is native to South America but has choked lakes around the world including, famously, Lake Victoria in Africa.

Water hyacinth was originally considered a threat to Dianchi because it could outcompete other species and choke the lake. But now that agricultural and residential runoff have created an overabundance of nitrogen and phosphorus in the lake, scientists are hoping the plant can absorb large amounts of those substances from the water.

The pilot project aims to develop better methods of mechanized harvesting and converting the plant into fertilizer or methane gas.

It is unclear if this project is part of any sort of larger comprehensive strategy for cleaning up the lake, on which 100 billion yuan (US$ 14.6 billion) is expected to be spent by the year 2020.

Image: Human Flower Project