Science and Technology Daily | Meet with A Clean Nanming River and People’s Happy Faces

2022-07-14

Behind Guiyang’s Water Environment Management —

A Clean Nanming River and People’s Happy Faces

“Living a life of contentment is the ultimate human right.”

“The river has become clear now. I will take a walk here after dinner every day.” Rui Jie, who lives in Xihu Road community, Nanming District, Guiyang, Guizhou Province, spoke happily about the changes of Nanming River. From the air, looking down, the Nanming River flows quietly like a green ribbon winding through the city.

Who would have thought that the beautiful Nanming River was once a dirty and smelly river that keeps Guiyang citizens away?

The 4th International Conference on the Evolution of China Urban Water Environment and Ecology opened in Guiyang from July 7 to 9th, 2022. The governance mode of Nanming River has attracted great attention. Tu Ruihe, the representative of the United Nations Environment Programme to China, said, "It’s a good opportunity for learning and inspecting. I’m quite looking forward to this trip."

“A lifeless river”

With a total length of 185 kilometers, Nanming River flows through the most populous area with the most active commerce and the most concentrated productive life in Guiyang. It’s not only the mother river of the locals, but also an important ecological barrier in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and the Pearl River.

Since the 1980s, with a large amount of domestic and industrial sewage discharged into the river, the water quality has been deteriorating and the pollution has become increasingly serious. It has once become a "lifeless River".

Rui Jie has lived around the Nanming River for 30 years. She recalled the stinky Nanming River and said she has to quicken her pace every time she passes by. Nanming River flows through many landmark attractions in Guiyang. As a must-visit spot, it will "harm the image of the city".

In those years, there have been callings for saving the Nanming River. Guiyang Municipal Party Committee and the local government attached great importance to the governance of the Nanming River. They set up a monument along the Nanming River, promising to clear it up in three years. Comprehensive management was conducted several times, which had alleviated the pollution. However, the result was still far from people’s expectations.

Dredging and damming separately cannot alleviate the ecological pressure of the whole Nanming River. At that time, like most of the other cities, the sewage along the Nanming River was intercepted and then treated intensively. But the disadvantage is that the river is too long that the sewage intercepting ditch and the end of river are easy to overload, resulting in sewage overflow.

Obviously, we need to think outside the box.

“A distributed mode” is bound to overturn the traditional governance

Since the "centralized" processing is not working, why not change? Therefore, Guiyang has introduced social capital and technical forces, and CWEG was in charge.

In harnessing the Nanming River, we should bear in mind its watershed characteristic, adopting a distributed mode in a systematic way. “Eight years ago, there was no national standard nor successful precedent for reference, but with the government's dedicated support for scientific and technological innovation, we managed to do it.” Hou Feng said that the governance of Nanming River is a successful practice. It shows that the team’s years of theoretical results have been paid off.

Through overall planning and step-by-step implementation, a DURWecosystem has been built in Guiyang. According to the sewerage and drainage, functional zoning and resource utilization of cities, CWEG has built and reconstructed 21 underground WWTPs along the Nanming River. It changed the way how the world deals with sewage for centuries. Instead of being discharged as pollutants, the urban sewage was recycled and reused. Moreover, with sewage facilities built underground, the ground space can be used to build commercial complex, parks and stadiums, so as to save land resources, lower costs and protect the environment.

Guiyang also carried out a bunch of measures. Enterprises are not allowed to discharge the sewage directly into the river; Collecting and reducing the odor at the ditch by technical means; Building a data monitoring platform to crack down on enterprises’ illegal discharges.

A Clean Nanming River and More Happy Faces

After 8 years of management with investment of RMB 7.6 billion, the Nanming River is now a clean river with fishes swimming and egrets flying. It has become an epitome of Guizhou’s ecological progress. The management of Nanming River is a good example for cities of the same type. Moreover, it’s the world's first "water management model for cities".

“A good ecological environment is the most valuable public product for people.” Zhang Tao, the deputy dean of Chinese Academy of Sciences thinks that the Nanming River’s successful treatment is a useful reference for the large and medium-sized cities in China.

"With limited management scope, the traditional WWTPs often come with bad smell and produce noises while the Underground WWTPs can solve all these problems and to further improve the sewage treatment capacity and the ecological environment of the river.” Chen Wenli, secretary of the Party Group and director of the Water Authority of Guiyang Nanming District, said Nanming District continues to promote the management of the Nanming River. A team of party members has been formed to carry out regular inspections, so as to safeguard the beautiful Nanming River.

" I will walk all the way home along the Nanming River when I’m off work. Looking at the landscape, I just let the breeze blows my fatigue away.” Xiong Yan, who works near Jiaxiu Pavilion, said that she saw more and more happy faces as the Nanming River became clear.

So far, the governance mode of Nanming River has been promoted in Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Dali and other cities. And Hou Feng has been thinking about improving people's livelihood and well-being with more science and technology.

Link:http://digitalpaper.stdaily.com/http_www.kjrb.com/kjrb/html/2022-07/14/content_538468.htm?div=-1

 
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