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Podcast: Exchanges: A Cambridge UP Podcast
Episode: Xiangli Ding, "Hydropower Nation: Dams, Energy, and Political Changes in Twentieth-Century China" (Cambridge UP, 2024)
Description: As a rising infrastructure powerhouse, China has the largest electricity generation capacity in the world today. Its number of large dams is second to none. In Hydropower Nation: Dams, Energy, and Political Changes in Twentieth-Century China (Cambridge UP, 2024), Xiangli Ding provides a historical understanding of China's ever-growing energy demands and how they have affected its rivers, wild species, and millions of residents. River management has been an essential state responsibility throughout Chinese history. In the industrial age, with the global proliferation of concrete dam technology, people started to demand more from rivers, particularly when required for electricity production. Yet hy...