Mainland slakes Kinmen's thirst for fresh water

It has been five years since the taps were opened on a landmark pipeline supplying fresh water from the city of Quanzhou in Fujian province on the Chinese mainland to the island of Kinmen, which lies some three kilometers off the coast and is governed by Taiwan authorities.

After 23 years of negotiations, preparations and construction, the 28-kilometer pipeline came online in August 2018, providing the residents of Kinmen with a reliable source of fresh water and overcoming past difficulties.

As of Oct 13, Fujian had supplied more than 30 million metric tons of fresh water to Kinmen, with a daily average of 15,800 tons, Fujian Water Resources Investment and Development Group, the pipeline's operator, said.

Water from Fujian accounts for 73 percent of the daily water supply on the island, meaning the residents no longer need to rely on tapping patchy groundwater sources, which could often become too salty. The residents' dependence on groundwater has fallen from 68 percent before the pipeline to 14.3 percent, the group said.

Over the years, the authorities on Kinmen invested in ways to improve the supply of fresh water, including pouring money into a desalination plant that proved expensive and inefficient.

In 1995, at the request of the Kinmen county government, authorities on both sides of the Taiwan Strait began negotiating for a freshwater pipeline from the mainland. A contract was signed in 2015 and construction began the same year. The pipe was completed at the end of 2017 and passed testing in May 2018.

The source of the water is the Longhu Reservoir in Jinjiang, a county administered by Quanzhou.

"Since the water supply began, our staff members have been working in shifts 24 hours a day without interruption," said Hong Jiaxing, general manager of Jinjin Water Supply, a division of Fujian Water Resources Investment and Development Group. "To ensure a high-quality and sufficient water supply, we have implemented a series of measures, including real-time monitoring online, manual testing in laboratories, and testing conducted by outside professional organizations.

"Furthermore, we conduct unmanned vehicle inspections of underwater pipelines four times a month to ensure pipeline safety."

Yang Hsin-hang, director of Kinmen County Waterworks, told Fujian Daily: "For the past five years, the water supply from Fujian has been stable, with an average daily supply of over 15,000 tons. The water quality is good, greatly reducing the treatment cost for the water plants.

"In the past, we had to rely on natural sources for water, and faced numerous problems such as water shortage, over-pumping of groundwater and algal blooms in reservoirs. Now, the water from Fujian has made us feel more secure."

In the spring of 2021, Kinmen experienced a severe drought. Fujian increased the daily water supply to 25,700 tons, setting a record for the water supply project, which helped the people on the island overcome their difficulties.

The water supply project has become an important symbol for cross-Strait exchanges.

In 2019, the project was named the "Cross-Strait Water Supply Exchange Center".

In 2021, it was approved as a "Fujian Provincial Communication Base for Taiwan", and efforts are being made for it to become a national-level communication base for cross-Strait exchanges.

In the past five years, the project has been visited by more than 50 groups comprising over 1,500 visitors from Taiwan, making it a symbol of enhanced friendship between people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.

"We are planning to build a water conservancy project memorial hall, which will show the whole journey of the Fujian-Kinmen water supply project from planning, design and construction to management and protection, especially to show all the hard work of the participants and witnesses," said Wang Yefu, vice-mayor of Jinjiang. "We hope it can be used to tell the story of cross-Strait water supply to the next generation."