More than 2.5 million people are at risk from contaminated
drinking water caused by heavy pollution at five water plants in
the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, a recent study has
claimed.
Guangzhou has eight water plants, but supplies at the Jiangcun,
Shimen, Xicun, Shixi, and Baihedong facilities have been
contaminated by heavy metals, chemicals, and other industrial
pollutants, the study said.
Conducted by the population, resource, and environment
commission of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Chinese
People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the study has
been passed to the province's top advisory body for
consideration.
The five plants have a combined drinking water output of 2.53
million tons, and supply about 2.67 million people throughout
Guangzhou's Liwan and Yuexiu districts and parts of Baiyun and
Haizhu.
The plants are fed from the Liuxi River and western section of
the Pearl River route.
"These rivers have been heavily polluted by industrial
pollutants and sewage from large corporations over the past
decade," Xie Yeming, an official with the CPPCC Guangdong
Provincial Committee, said.
Xie, together with other deputies at the CPPCC Guangdong
Provincial Committee, have called for the development of
alternative sources for the polluted plants. "New water sources
must be introduced because the water quality in these plants is
still low, even after treatment," Xie said in an interview
yesterday with China Daily.
According to Xie, the city's water resources authority has made
considerable efforts to clean up the sources, but the water quality
in the rivers does not even reach the minimum standard for human
consumption.
"It contains high levels of ammonia, fluoride, fecal coliform
bacteria, and heavy metals. That means we have a lot of work to do
to make it fit for industrial use and consumption by local people,"
Xie said.
He said that the Xijiang and Beijiang rivers - both of which are
tributaries of the Pearl River - could provide alternative sources
for the plants, as they already feed the city's three plants whose
water supplies are safe. "Projects to divert water from the Xijiang
and Beijing rivers to these polluted plants should be started as
soon as possible, to ensure we have sufficient supplies of safe
drinking water," Xie said.
(China Daily April 3, 2007)
