Up to 20 million people, thousands of whom are already displaced from their homes following the devastating Chinese earthquake, are at increased risk from flooding and major power shortages in the massive Sichuan Basin over the next few decades and possibly centuries.
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| © Dr. Alex Densmore, Durham University
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| Ruined village.
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Dr Alex Densmore, a geographer from Durham University, makes the observations on returning from carrying out investigative fieldwork in the China earthquake zone, where nearly 100,000 people were killed in May 2008. He has been studying the active faults in Sichuan for the past eight years.
The biggest risk is posed by the ongoing landslides in Sichuan province, a common occurrence after major earthquakes such as these. Landslides cause rocks and sediment to be dumped in the river valleys, and this material then moves downstream to settle on river beds.
In some areas, river beds are already two to three metres higher due to the increased amounts of sediment after the earthquake. This means that during periods of heavy rains the rivers have greater potential to burst their banks - a risk that will last for decades to centuries.
