Recently, the Yongding River has frozen all along the river course due to strong cold waves. Up to now, water is flowing all along the Yongding River course throughout the whole year, the first time since its drying-up in 1996 due to impacts of climate change and human activities. It sheds light on a milestone in the progress of the Yongding River water regulation.

Yongding River, the mother river of Beijing, bears pivotal importance of an ecological corridor in promoting coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, serving as a backbone water allocation channel for the national water network. In 2023, relevant departments in the basin jointly established mechanisms for water scheduling, early warning and weekly consultation. Moreover, endeavors including refined scheduling and small flow discharge were made to tackle the problem of insufficient water resources and ensure water flows throughout the entire river course. In late November, Ministry of Water Resources implemented water replenishment from multiple water sources in advance, in order to expand the water-covered area in the river course as large as possible. In 2023, Ministry of Water Resources made full use of four water sources, namely local water, Yellow River water, Yangtze River water and reclaimed water. A total of 220 million m3 of water from outside of the Yongding River basin was recharged into the Yongding River. Thanks to these efforts, the Yongding River course is now filled with running water for the whole year, creating favorable conditions for water dispatching in the next spring.

In the next step, Ministry of Water Resources plans to organize relevant departments in the basin to strengthen unified dispatching of water quantity, so as to ensure that water flows all year long in the river, and ultimately restore the healthy life of the Yongding River.

Source: INTCE