A construction site of the Pearl River Delta water resource allocation project in Foshan, south China's Guangdong Province, April 1, 2021. /CFP
Tunnel boring on one of China's 172 major water resource projects, the Pearl River Delta water resource allocation project, was completed on Saturday, according to the country's Ministry of Water Resource.
The tunnel will be used for building water pipelines that run for 113.2 kilometers at 40 to 60 meters underground.
Construction site of the Pearl River Delta water resource allocation project in south China's Guangdong Province. /Xinhua
The Pearl River Delta, which refers to the densely populated network of cities surrounding the Pearl River in south China's Guangdong Province, is home to nearly 30 million people.
The project is intended to solve water shortages in Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Dongguan, and provide emergency backup water for Hong Kong and other places with water pipelines extended from a section of the Xijiang River in Foshan.
It is the world's largest water resources project in terms of water pressure and tunnel shield length.
The 35.4 billion yuan ($5.22 billion) project is designed to pump an average of 1.708 billion cubic meters of water each year.