Middle route of China's mega diversion project offers 50b cubic meters of water

BEIJING -- The middle route of China's South-to-North Water Diversion Project has transferred more than 50 billion cubic meters of water to the country's parched north by Friday, said the company in charge of the project.

The middle route has benefited 85 million people in regions along the route including Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei and Henan, said the China South-to-North Water Diversion Corporation Limited.

Water transferred from the middle route has jumped from over 2 billion cubic meters per year to 9 billion cubic meters, and the water quality has stood above the second class on China's five-tier quality scale for surface water, said the company.

The South-to-North Water Diversion Project has three routes.

The middle route, the most prominent of the three due to its role in feeding water to the nation's capital, starts from the Danjiangkou Reservoir and runs across Henan and Hebei before reaching Beijing and Tianjin. It began supplying water on Dec 12, 2014.

The eastern route of the project began operations in November 2013, transferring water from East China's Jiangsu province to feed areas including Tianjin and Shandong.

The western route is at the planning stage and is yet to be built.