The first thousand two hundred and ninety-three chapters of the three major plans for the governance
A flood occurred in the fifteenth year of Xuanping's reign, which frightened Li Xuan and the top officials of the empire half to death.
This kind of shock is not only due to the flood itself, but also because although this heavy rainstorm is heavy, according to the report of the Royal Institute of Technology and the experience of local farmers, such heavy rains do not say once every ten years, but they happen every twenty or thirty years.
It's normal for it to happen once a year.
This means that the current flood control system in the Yellow River and Huaihe River basins can only support a flood that occurs once in ten years. If this limit is exceeded, large-scale floods will occur.
And even ordinary rainfall that occurs once in ten years or even every year will cause small to medium-sized floods.
And this situation is intolerable to the empire!
It is urgent to build water conservancy facilities, especially the two hardest-hit areas combined with the Yellow River and Huaihe River, which need to be rectified immediately.
After the floods this summer, the empire has already begun to construct water conservancy facilities in the above-mentioned areas, but more of them are combined with disaster relief and through the work-for-relief model. Generally speaking, its focus is not on building water conservancy facilities, but on building water conservancy facilities.
It's disaster relief.
But starting this winter, Li Xuan has already instructed relevant yamen, especially the Ministry of Works responsible for large-scale infrastructure projects, to make a series of related plans to build overall flood control projects for the Yellow River and Huaihe River basins.
In particular, major vulnerable locations are taking advantage of the fall in water levels in autumn and winter to step up construction to prepare for floods in the coming spring and summer.
For this reason, the empire has already prepared about three million yuan in special funds in advance for the management of the Yellow River and the Huaihe River just in the autumn and winter of this year.
This part of the funds was not actually included in the fiscal expenditure budget for the fifteenth year of Xuanping, because the fiscal expenditure budget for the fifteenth year of Xuanping had already been spent. A flood would have a serious financial impact on the empire.
of.
In order to fight floods and provide disaster relief, the empire has spent about 15 million yuan. Five million yuan of this money is the emergency fund of the empire's central government, and about 3 million yuan is squeezed out from various departments.
It was squeezed out from local finances, and the other two million came from donations from all walks of life.
Such a huge expense can also prove how harmful floods are!
In order to avoid another flood in the coming year, even though the treasury was already empty and could starve to death, Li Xuan still forcibly spent three million yuan on the Yellow River and Huaihe River management projects.
This money was borrowed from the Imperial Bank and used first. It would be repaid from the water conservancy budget in the 16th year of Xuanping.
Therefore, although the water conservancy budget for the 16th year of Xuanping was finalized in December, the relevant projects were actually started in September.
With the arrival of the Spring Festival, the empire also officially entered the 16th year of Xuanping.
Just after the Spring Festival, the cabinet staff reported to Li Xuan the management work of the Yellow and Huaihe Rivers.
"Based on past experience, we have formulated a series of treatment plans for the Yellow River and Huaihe River basins, and the prerequisite focus is on building dams and expanding the capacity of reservoirs to ensure that large-scale floods do not occur.
"
"The construction of key dams includes the dams in Kaifeng area, Hongze Lake levee, etc. For the dams in the above key areas, we are preparing to adopt a new construction model and use a large amount of cement in the project. Especially the Hongze Lake levee will
We use stone strips, cement and other materials on a large scale and strive to build a super dam that will never break!"
“By building the Hongze Lake embankment and relocating the towns and villages around the original Hongze Lake, the area of the entire Hongze Lake will be expanded to more than three times its current size, and many existing lakes will be connected.
The water storage capacity can be increased by more than five times than before!”
"The expansion project of Hongze Lake can not only resist floods, but also effectively improve the area's river transportation capacity, thereby increasing the transportation capacity of the entire canal!"
The reports of cabinet officials focused more on the Hongze Lake expansion project, and this project was also a key project formulated by the Imperial Tang Dynasty after many discussions.
According to the relevant research report of the Royal Institute of Technology, it is very difficult to completely control the Yellow River and achieve the effect once and for all, because this is simply not something that can be achieved by building river embankments. The root cause of the difficulty of regulating the Yellow River lies not in building river embankments.
It lies in the soil erosion in the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River.
Soil erosion in the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River has caused the water of the Yellow River to be mixed with a large amount of sediment. This sediment accumulates on the river bed and continuously raises the river bed, which in turn forces the river embankments to be continuously raised.
Therefore, the root cause of regulating the Yellow River is to solve the problem of soil erosion in the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River. To solve this problem, it is actually impossible to do so at present. On the one hand, part of the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River is not in the control area of Datang.
Even if they are all under the control of the Tang Dynasty, the empire still has enough strength to plant trees and avoid over-development and other problems. It will take at least several decades to achieve initial results.
It is too difficult to solve the problem once and for all, and it cannot be done even in a short time.
Therefore, the Royal Institute of Technology proposed the second plan and claimed that this plan can ensure that the Yellow River will be under control in the next hundred years.
This second plan is to actively reroute the Yellow River, blast the river embankments in a certain area, artificially break the embankments, and then let the Yellow River flow to the pre-set river course, so that the Yellow River can divert the Huaihe River from the existing south to the sea, and change the direction of flow.
Shandong enters the sea.
This is to change the shared outlet of the Yellow River and the Huaihe River, causing Wanbei and Jiangbei to face floods every year during the flood season.
In addition, this has another advantage, which is to solve the water resources problem in the north.
We must know that the distribution of water resources in the north and south of China is very unbalanced. Since the Yellow River took away the Huaihe River and entered the sea, water shortages in Hebei, Shandong and other places have led to frequent droughts, while northern Anhui and Jiangbei have suffered from the influx of water from the Yellow River.
, faces flood crisis every year.
If the Yellow River can be diverted artificially, many problems can be solved at the same time.
This proactive diversion plan actually means that since the existing river bed of the Yellow River is high, then it needs to be replaced with a new river course. Although it is still a temporary solution rather than a permanent solution, through advance planning, it can ensure that the next few decades can be ensured.
years of safety.
In this process, assisting in the management of water and soil problems in the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River, it is expected that the Yellow River problem will be initially solved in fifty years.
Fifty years later, Li Xuan estimated that the empire's scientific and technological level would be greatly improved, and then targeted management would be carried out, such as building a super hydropower station.
Simply and roughly divide the Yellow River into two or three or four, and adjust the water level of the Yellow River through the super dam. At that time, it will not only solve the problem of flooding, but also solve the problem of low water level in the autumn and winter that affects navigation.
Question, by the way, it can also generate electricity.
What's more important is that it can be used as a water conservancy project and for irrigation.
However, this proposal also has huge problems at present, that is, it is necessary to plan the course of the Yellow River, relocate it in advance, and build river embankments at the same time. It cannot be said that there is no preparation, and then the Yellow River is directly changed. In this case, it is not possible
It’s called governance, but it’s called floods…
It's just that such a large-scale project affecting several provinces and millions of people is actually very difficult to solve in a short time.
This plan is approved by many people. Even Li Xuan is very inclined to this plan. However, the implementation of this plan is too difficult. Just planning the river channel and relocating the people is a huge and time-consuming task.
project, unless Li Xuan directly changes the course of the Yellow River regardless of the life and death of the people.
Therefore, although this plan has been determined by the top management, it is currently in the early planning and preparation stage, and there is no possibility of the plan being implemented for at least ten years.
For this reason, the Royal Institute of Technology has proposed a third plan. This plan can also be regarded as a plan that does not cure the root cause, but is also a simple and super-large project to eliminate violence.
That is the Hongze Lake expansion plan!
The core of this plan is very simple, that is, to directly use Hongze Lake as a reservoir!
In fact, this plan is also an extension of the current Yellow River and Huaihe River management plan. Hongze Lake has been used as a reservoir since the Ming Dynasty to reduce the harm of floods.
It's just that the technical level and construction ability of the pre-Ming Dynasty were limited, so the water storage capacity of Hongze Lake was limited, and the embankment of Hongze Lake was still an earthen embankment.
However, the current Datang Empire's technical level and more importantly its construction capabilities far exceed those of the Ming Dynasty and even any traditional feudal dynasty. The Datang Empire has enough strength to build a super Hongze Lake embankment and
The water of Hongze Lake is restrained.
At the same time, its official organizational capabilities far exceeded those of traditional dynasties, and it also allowed the Tang Empire to centrally relocate people from surrounding areas to expand the area of Hongze Lake, thereby increasing the existing water storage capacity of Hongze Lake to sufficient
More than five times the extent.
After detailed consideration, Li Xuan officially approved the simultaneous implementation of these three major plans. However, the priority was first and last. The Hongze Lake expansion plan was the best plan to implement immediately. A large amount of funds and personnel were allocated, and construction was required to begin immediately.
stage.
The second plan, that is, the Yellow River diversion plan, has entered the preparation stage, conducting research and preparation work, and carrying out drawing work.
As for the first option, which is to solve the sediment problem in the Yellow River, it is in the research stage to work out a detailed feasible plan.
The focus of these plans is naturally the Hongze Lake expansion plan. This plan is directly related to the safety of the Huaihe River in the next twenty years or even longer. Even if the Yellow River changes its course in the future, Hongze Lake can still play a huge role in flood control.
, irrigation, navigation and other functions, because in addition to the Yellow River, there is also the Huaihe River.
Sixteen years after entering Xuanping, taking advantage of the fact that there are still a few months left before the summer flood season, the Hongze Lake project has also entered an intense period of attack!