Liuxihe Dam

The Liuxihe Dam is an arch dam on the Liuxi River in Conghua District, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China. The main purpose of the project is hydroelectric power generation with additional purposes of flood control and irrigation. The dam is 78 m tall and was constructed between 1956 and 1958.

Construction
In September 1955, planning for dams in the Liuxi River basin began and by January 1956, plans for the Liuxihe Dam were complete. In August 1956, construction on the dam began and excavation commenced the next month and continued until April 1957, removing 680000 m3 of rock and material. The same month that excavation was complete, concrete placement began and continued until September 1958. Earlier in August, the first generator was placed online and the rest were operational by the end of 1958. Originally, the dam supported 4 × 10.5 MW generators but in 1993, they were upgraded to 12 MW each.

Design
The dam is a 255.5 m long and 78 m high double-curvature arch dam with a crest width of 2 m and base width of 22 m. The dam is composed of 130000 m3 of concrete and contains seven openings on its surface to discharge water downstream. Each opening is 11.5 m wide and 4 m high with a discharge capacity of 141 m3/s each. A 237 m long discharge tunnel with a maximum capacity of 1070 m3/s is also built on the dam's right bank.

An axillary dam was built in conjunction with the project in order to protect low-lying areas from the reservoir. It is located about 2 km northwest of the main dam and is an embankment type. The dam is 29.7 m tall and 220 m long while having a structural volume of 350000 m3. After the completion of the Huanglongdai Dam in June 1975, the downstream side of the auxiliary dam is now the Huanglongdai Reservoir in which it now serves to regulate both.