Video: Large-scale water transfer scheme: China

﻿Hi, I'm Miss Goacher, and welcome to today's lesson. Our lesson today is part of our global resources units with our focus on water. And we're going to look at a large scale water transfer scheme in China. If you were with us last lesson, you will have learned more about water transfer schemes, but we're going to get to know a little bit more about why water has been transferred in China, where it's been transferred from and to, and some of the advantages and disadvantages of that scheme. You're going to need a pen and some paper today, whilst we go through the lesson for you to be able to make some notes. So if you need to pause the video and go and grab those, please feel free to do so and then we can resume the lesson together. Why are transfer schemes needed then? In some areas of the world, water transfer is needed to take water from areas of water surplus, to areas of water deficit. Remind yourself of the definition of both of those key terms. Water surplus is when there is more than enough water to meet demand and water deficit is when there isn't enough water to meet demand. So water is usually transferred from those areas where there is enough water to meet demand to those areas where there isn't. We usually transfer that water through canals and pipes, but pumping stations and aqueducts, artificial channels are also sometimes used to move water across hills and valleys. You can see the example on the screen, and this is a water transfer scheme that moves water from areas of surplus in Wales, to areas of deficit in Liverpool. We're focusing today on China. And water stress occurs in some areas of China, where there is water deficit. We can link that very clearly to patterns of precipitation. And again, remind yourself that key term precipitation. Precipitation is anything linked to rainfall, snow, sleet, or hail. Our question on the screen asks us to describe the pattern of precipitation in China. It's worth four marks. Our map shows us some different coloured areas of China, and we can see very clearly in the key here, what those colours represent. This is a choropleth map and the darker blue colours on this map show us areas where there is higher amounts of precipitation or rainfall, and the lighter colours show us areas where there's lower amounts of precipitation. We need to describe that pattern. The success criteria asks us to identify general areas of high rainfall, general areas of low rainfall, use some compass directions and province names and use data from the key. So you might, for example, look at this area here of China and call this the Northwest of China, use the name of the province and refer to some of the data in the key here. You're going to need to pause the video at this point to complete this task, but look very carefully at the success criteria to help you structure your answer and make sure you're using information from the map in the work that you write down. So did you get any of these ideas here? What I've used to describe the pattern of precipitation is precipitation is highest in the Southeast of the country, in areas such as Guangdong, Fuijan, and Jiangxi. This is worth one mark. Using these province names would get us a mark. I've then gone on to talk about some data from the map. So I've said, this is over 1500 or 1,500 millimetres of rain. And that gives me my second mark. My second paragraph reads, precipitation is lowest in the North and Northwest of the country in areas such as Xinjiang, Beijing, which is an area we'll look at later in the lesson, and inner Mongolia. Again, we would get a point for using specific province names and then I've referred to the data in the key to help me back up what I'm saying by saying, this is between zero and 500 millimetres of rain. Double check that you've got some of these ideas here. If you need to pause the video at this point to double check and to borrow any ideas from the screen, please feel free. We now know a little bit about precipitation patterns across China, but why did China need a water transfer scheme? Northern China is home to two cities with over 10 million people, Beijing and Tianjin, we call those mega cities. You can see them located just here. This map is another choropleth map, showing population density this time. The darker colours show the highest density and the lighter colours show the lowest density. There is a really clear pattern here of higher population density in the North and the Northeast of the country, especially near to those two areas of Beijing and Tianjin. There was a high demand of water. That's due to these high population densities, but also due to expanding industries in this part of the country and increasing agricultural land that needs to be irrigated. In the past, ground water was used to help meet the demand, but this has led to water shortages in rural areas, along with land subsidence and sand storms as the soil dried out and the land became unstable, putting pressure on the agricultural industries in the region. That gives us some context for why China was in need of a water transfer scheme. And if we were to put those two maps together, we can see very clearly that those two areas on the map are areas that have low precipitation and high population density. They're both areas that are going to be in need of high amounts of water, but there may not naturally be high amounts of water to be able to supply people. So this map here shows us the planned proposal that the Chinese government put into place. We can see very clearly, we've got our two mega city areas, Beijing and Tianjin here in the North, the eastern and the central route, both move water from areas of surplus in the south to those areas of deficit in the north. The eastern and central routes were completed in 2013 and 2014. The western route, over here is planned to be completed by around 2050. And you can see very clearly that the routes move the water to those areas of high population density and as we've seen already, low precipitation. So the $62 billion scheme began in 2002. And the central and eastern routes we've just looked at, were completed in 2013 and 14. The western route is planned to be completed by 2050. The water is transferred through pumping stations and tunnels. And the eastern route has nearly nine kilometres of tunnels and 23 pumping stations. We can see in the image on the screen, one of these parts of the transfer project, this is part of the central route. And that also includes structures like dams as part of this large scale engineering project. At this point in the lesson, I want us to see what we've learnt so far. You've got four quiz questions on the screen that you need to answer for me. Question one asks you to give one reason that China needed a transfer scheme. Question two asks you how much was spent on the scheme? Question three asks you when the works on the central and eastern routes were completed? And question four asks you to pick the two strategies that were used to transfer water along the eastern route of the scheme. You're going to need to pause the video at this point, to complete these four quiz questions. And when you resume, we will go through the answers together. So for question one, the three reasons that you could have chosen one from where agriculture, population density and industry, some of you may have also referred to the lower precipitation levels that we saw in our choropleth task at the beginning of the lesson. Question two, it was $62 billion, 44.8 billion was the amount of water metres cubed that was moved by the scheme. Question three, they were completed in 2013, 2014. And question four, the two strategies were the pumping stations and the tunnels. So that moves us on to our last part of this little example, the advantages and disadvantages. This will allow you to evaluate the scheme accurately. You've got four advantages, clean water is now transferred to those two mega cities of Beijing and Tianjin. Industrial development can continue in the north and bring income and wealth to the region and to the population living there. Water can now be used for irrigation of crops, which is great for agriculture as crop yields will increase and therefore income can increase and it should stop over abstraction of groundwater and therefore reduce that subsidence of land as the water is not being removed as quickly. Disadvantages linked to the scheme include the fact that construction has flooded large areas of land and damaged fragile ecosystems and habitats. The building of dams and the building of some of these larger structures linked to the water transfer means that areas of land have to be reused and therefore ecosystems and habitats are destroyed or damaged. Diverting so much water from those areas of surplus in the south could put pressure on the supplies and therefore increase water stress. And the water supply to Beijing is super expensive and is only available in the main urban areas. That means the urban poor and many people in the rural areas or countryside have little or no access to the water that's been diverted. So at this point in the lesson, we're going to do a quick little summary task. You've got each of those advantages and disadvantages on the screen again, but this time they're not in their correct category. I want you to pause the video and see if you can put statements A to F into the correct category to show whether they are an advantage or a disadvantage, pause the video, see if you can pop those into the correct categories. And when you resume, we'll go through those answers together. So our three advantages were statement B, C, and F, and our three disadvantages were statements A, D and E. If you need to pause the video to borrow any ideas or to double check that you've got that correct please do so before we move on to the main task of the lesson. So our main task includes two, three mark questions. Question one asks us to explain one advantage of the water transfer scheme in China. And question two asks us to explain one disadvantage of the water transfer scheme in China. I've put some structure of ideas on the screen to give you a hand in how you approach these questions. For question one, you might choose to start your answer with one advantage of the water transfer scheme in China is, you then may develop your ideas using phrases like "this means that." And "leading to." For question two, you might start it with one disadvantage of the water transfer scheme in China is, this can lead to, which means that. Again, we've got our double development using those key phrases. You're going to need to spend about four minutes or so on both of the questions so you're going to need to pause the video. But really do look back at those advantages and disadvantages that you've just sorted to make sure you're using specific ideas. Use the structure ideas as well, and when you resume the video, we'll go through some ideas and model answers together. For question one then, we could have said one advantage of the water transfer scheme in China is the provision of clean water to people in Beijing and Tianjin. This means that they can use this to support industry and agriculture leading to higher incomes and increase wealth for China. We've got a specific idea for a mark and two very clearly developed ideas as well, which gives us our other two marks. You may also have use ideas related to the reduction of over abstraction of groundwater, reducing the risk of land subsidence or irrigation of farmland, increasing crop yields and income. Check that you've got those ideas and pause If you need to. Underline or highlight where you've developed your ideas and that specific advantage that you've picked out. For question two, we could have written one disadvantage of the water transfer scheme in China is the environmental damage caused by construction. This has led to large areas of land being flooded, leading to the destruction of habitats and fragile ecosystems. We've picked up a specific disadvantage and we've doubled developed our ideas using those connective phrases. You could have used reference to water stress in the south being increased as the water was diverted away, or the fact that the water provided to Beijing is expensive and only the urban areas are able to access it. Pause if you need to, to check that you know, and that you've developed those ideas really clearly. Highlight or underline where you've used those phrases. And if you need to, borrow any ideas for the screen. That brings us to the very end of today's lesson, a massive well done. You today, have been able to look at a specific example of a large scale water transfer scheme in China. We now know why China needs to transfer water and the areas of surplus and deficit. We can talk about how they've transferred that water and the advantages and disadvantages of the scheme. You should do the quizzes associated with the lesson to make sure that you can show yourself and us what you've learned. And if you choose to join us next lesson, then we'll continue to look at water. But this time round we'll be looking at sustainable ways of producing and providing water resources. You may ask a parent or carer to share your work, on one of our social media platforms, but for now, a really big well done.

Exit Quiz: Large-scale water transfer scheme: China

Completed: Large-scale water transfer scheme: China

In this lesson we will be studying the advantages and disadvantages of the large-scale water transfer scheme used in China.

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Large-scale water transfer scheme: China

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