Chapter 72: Water and Power (Part 2)

Wang Luobin remembered little of Zhuo Tianmin—only that he had a son who had once visited the Committee looking for Xiao Zishan, asking for a chit to obtain an egg from Wu Nanhai. An egg for his child. They were the scarcest commodity these days, with only three or four produced daily, normally reserved for the sick.

The man appeared to be in his mid-thirties, wearing a training suit caked with stone dust and mud. He stood pointing at the newly constructed pressure forebay, his eyes fixed on the structure rather than any of the people gathered around him.

"According to the design drawings, the inlet chamber floor should be higher than the anterior chamber floor. These have been built level."

The engineering crew had gathered in a silent circle. Mei Wan shifted impatiently. "We're talking about a few centimeters. What's the big deal? If we scrutinized every detail in those drawings, this would be nothing but a jerry-rigged mess."

Zhuo Tianmin's expression hardened. "That kind of substitution is acceptable when materials are lacking—that can't be helped. But this pressure forebay used the full amount of cement, gravel, and sand. So why didn't we follow the drawings?"

"The crew didn't understand the drawings well enough," Bing Feng offered, attempting to mediate. "They didn't notice the difference..."

"That makes even less sense." Zhuo Tianmin's voice carried across the site. "The workers are novices, not professionals—no one blames them. But we're all in construction engineering. How can we excuse such an elementary mistake?" Murmurs rippled through the crowd.

Several of the professionals flushed red. Mei Wan had no rebuttal, so he simply asked, "What do you suggest, then?"

"Demolish it. Rebuild according to specifications."

"That wastes materials and delays the entire schedule!" Mei Wan nearly jumped at him. "Besides, you're not even in hydraulic engineering—do you actually know why the pool needs different levels? Drawings aren't always right. That happens all the time."

"I certainly don't know why," Zhuo Tianmin replied evenly. "But precisely because we don't understand, we must follow the drawings to the letter."

Someone in the crowd noticed movement behind them. "Commissioner Wang is here!"

Zhuo Tianmin turned at the announcement. Sure enough, Wang Luobin stood among the onlookers. He gave the commissioner a polite nod and fell silent, waiting.

"Engineer Zhuo, please continue."

"I've said everything I have to say. And I truly don't understand hydroelectric construction." His voice was cool, measured. "Commissioner Wang, you decide." He wanted to see this Committee member's true mettle. Every eye turned to Wang Luobin.

Wang Luobin walked a slow circuit around the pool, then retrieved a measuring rod to check the depths at various points. When he finished, he turned back to Zhuo Tianmin. "Engineer Zhuo, what do you think should be done?"

"Not building to drawings means substandard quality. We can fudge it for now, but there may be problems later."

Wang Luobin turned to Mei Wan. "And you?"

Mei Wan considered the question before answering. "There is deviation from the drawings, yes. But materials are scarce and we're on a tight deadline. I say we make do for now and improve it later when conditions allow."

The suggestion drew nods of approval from some members of the Building Group.

Wang Luobin acknowledged them, then shook his head. "Rework would waste cement and rebar, and it would delay our grid connection. But this matter cannot be fudged."

He pointed at the pool. "The pressure forebay is wider and deeper than the channel so that water entering it slows down, allowing sediment to settle. That's step one. The inlet chamber floor is built higher than the anterior chamber floor to prevent that settled sediment from rushing into the penstock—which ensures safe turbine operation."

Mei Wan realized he had again misread the Committee's priorities. The highway construction had led him to believe they valued speed above all else, so he had pushed the schedule. Now, watching the construction crew stare at him, he waved dismissively.

"Stop gawking. Demolish the problem sections and rework them."

The crew jumped into the pool with eight-pound hammers and began pounding away. Concrete chunks fell in heavy thuds. Wang Luobin's heart ached watching the destruction—who knew when they would be able to produce cement again? The long-range reconnaissance team had been dispatched precisely to locate new resources. They had been gone nearly a week now, with daily radio contact, but no survey results had come in yet.

Zhuo Tianmin stood apart from the others, studying Wang Luobin as if seeing him for the first time. His previous impression of Committee members was that they were affable but slippery. Xiao Zishan was the perfect example—he never said anything to displease anyone, yet you could never pin down his actual position on anything. Even when arbitrating disputes, he wielded rhetoric to preserve everyone's face. Zhuo Tianmin admired that kind of skill, yet simultaneously despised it—he saw it as a survival tactic for men who lacked professional substance.

He knew perfectly well that by speaking up several times in the Building Engineering Group, he had become a thorn in Mei Wan's side. But he did not care. Hadn't he brought his son here precisely to escape that hollow, hypocritical life? If he had to play those same games in another timespace, what was the point of coming at all?

The wind picked up, bending the flexible branches of nearby trees into vigorous waves. The vegetation around Bairren Rapids had been better preserved than elsewhere; dense forests blanketed the surrounding low hills, and the rising wind carried wave after wave of rustling leaves. Then the sky darkened suddenly—rain was coming. Once the defective sections were demolished, Mei Wan immediately reorganized his forces and personally led the crew in a rush to complete repairs. The concrete pour had to finish before the rain arrived. Wang Luobin pitched in as well, helping clear debris on-site.

As he worked, his mind wandered to what Director Wen had privately discussed with him: internal matters were not as simple as they appeared. These past days of construction coordination had already revealed cracks within the Building Group.

After re-pouring the concrete, turbine installation began immediately. The work demanded high precision—proper leveling and, ideally, placement in a single lift. Mei Wan called in the truck crane. After an afternoon of painstaking effort, the turbine was finally hoisted into position. With no bricks or tiles available for a proper powerhouse, they erected a temporary shelter instead.

The crew cleaned up scattered stones and debris in a light rain, installed the intake-channel gate, and finally completed the excavation of the intake opening. The curved wooden gate worked perfectly—not a drop of water surged through. Now they simply had to wait for the concrete to fully cure before generating power.

This small hydroelectric station—with its twenty-meter head and flow of two cubic meters per second—would provide the base with 200 kilowatts of power. Future plans envisioned five turbines producing a combined output of 1,000 kilowatts.

With two generators soon to be operating simultaneously, the previous simple direct-wiring arrangement would need to change. Chang Kai'en planned to establish a proper power grid, and the system had been procured complete. The grid would use 110-kilovolt high-voltage transmission, with industrial power at 380 volts and residential at 220 volts—matching existing voltage standards and the equipment they had brought with them.

Mei Wan had originally wanted to bury the transmission lines underground for safety, but without corrosion-resistant conduit, they continued using overhead poles instead. Fortunately, the distance from the hydroelectric zone to the main city was only a hundred meters—entirely within visual range. If necessary, walls could eventually connect the two zones, though for now that seemed unnecessary.

With power addressed, attention turned to the water supply system. The Wenlan River's water quality suffered mainly from upstream residential and agricultural runoff—high organic content with abundant algae, though relatively little sediment. For such conditions, traditional sedimentation and disinfection alone would not suffice. Algae produced foul odors that even chlorine could not mask. During the Taihu Wuxi cyanobacteria bloom, the water plant's output had met all chemical standards, yet the smell could not be eliminated.

Tian Jiujiu, serving as the water-supply specialist, surveyed the local hydrology and terrain before deciding on an infiltration-type intake system. River water would filter through the riverside soil before entering the reservoir, producing water that was typically uncontaminated and required minimal treatment.

The simplest approach would have been infiltration wells, but Tian Jiujiu had to account for the large population requiring supply and modern habits that consumed more water. He therefore adopted the more complex infiltration gallery system.

First, fifteen meters from the river and parallel to its bank, the crew dug a collection trench. Its depth had to extend one meter below the lowest water level. Inside the trench, they laid a filter bed of multiple layers: different grades of sand, gravel, and crushed stone. Collection pipes were buried at the center. Modern versions typically used perforated PVC pipe of fifty to one hundred millimeters in diameter; Tian Jiujiu had none, so he used concrete pipe instead—two-hundred-millimeter logs served as the inner mold, and a mixture of gravel, fine sand, and cement was cast around them on-site. This pipe did not need to be dense but rather porous, and the joints were left unsealed so that groundwater entering the trench could seep through. The entire trench was then covered with at least thirty millimeters of soil.

Finally, at the northern end of the trench—its lowest point—a clear-water well was built using concrete-mortar masonry. Filtered water flowing through the collection pipes ultimately gathered here to settle. The Building Engineering Group fabricated a reinforced-concrete cover for the well. The settled clear water would be pumped into an elevated water tower whose base was constructed of stone and cement-mortar masonry, topped with a ten-ton water tank salvaged from a ship. The tank's exterior was coated with cement mortar for waterproofing and rust prevention. An ozone generator was installed outside the tower—a device that used high-frequency electronics to produce ozone for sterilization. Ozone sterilization was no less effective than chlorine and did not require complex electrolysis equipment or elaborate piping, with minimal risk to human health. Until salt electrolysis became operational, this system would serve them well.

To protect against typhoons, the elevated tank was firmly guy-wired to the ground with heavy ship cables. The main water pipe running to the city was PVC. Since the Building Group's ambitious underground utility tunnel project had not yet begun, this water line was temporarily buried in a shallow ditch.

(End of Chapter)