Cover Story: Will a Barrier to the Yangtze River Save Poyang Lake?

Wu Hedao, a dark-skinned, 53-year-old fisherman, grew up on a small island in Poyang Lake, China’s largest freshwater lake located in the southeastern part of the country. For the past two decades, he has heard talk about the government’s plan to build an 18-meter (59-foot) dam to maintain the lake’s water level during the dry season.

What Wu doesn’t know is that the plan has been shelved for six years because of opposition from environmentalists. Now a revised project to build a sluice gate system is under discussion and open for public comments. It has renewed the debate over the impact on biodiversity.