Baker, Priscilla

Goldscheider, Nico

Yuexia, Wu

RERO DOC Digital Library

Yuan Daoxian: an interview with a distinguished hydrogeologistfrom ChinaNico Goldscheider & Wu Yuexia & Priscilla BakerKeywords Proﬁles . Interview . ChinaIntroductionThe world is very concerned about the huge environmen-tal problems in China. Yuan Daoxian (born in 1933) is oneof the leading scientists working on the investigation andresolution of these problems, with a particular focus on thekarst regions of southwest China, which are home to morethan 100 million people. Soil erosion and rock desertiﬁ-cation affect an estimated 100,000 km2, but groundwatercontamination and local or temporal water shortages arealso key problems to be addressed. Yuan Daoxian isarguably the most experienced karst and hydrogeologyresearcher in China; he is a great teacher to the youngergeneration, and a great communicator who has openedChinese karst and environmental research to the world.Among karst hydrogeologists, Yuan Daoxian is interna-tionally known. His early books and papers were writtenin Chinese and are consequently largely unknown to theinternational community, but represent standard referencesin China.During the workshop Current Technology in KarstHydrogeology and Water Resources that took place at theSouthwest University of China in Beibei, Chongqing, 7–14 October 2007, the authors had the opportunity to talkwith Yuan Daoxian about his life and his research (Fig. 1).The transcript of the interview and a map of the locationsmentioned are available as Electronic SupplementaryMaterial and the interview itself can be seen on theHydrogeologist Time Capsule website (http://timecapsule.iah.org). This proﬁle highlights several stations of his lifeand summarises his main scientiﬁc achievements, whichcan only be fully appreciated in relation to the recenthistory of China and the present environmental problemsin this emerging economic power.First professional experiences with karsthydrogeologyYuan Daoxian graduated from the College of Geology inNanjing in 1952 and had his ﬁrst professional experiencesas the deputy chief of an engineering and geological teamon a dam site on the Yellow River, before he went to Tibetfor three years in the mid 1950s. As the head of a smallteam of geologists there, he built a hydropower station forthe electricity supply of the Potala Palace in Lhasa. Inorder to make a survey of the hydropower resources of theYarlung Tsangpo River, he and his team walked along theriver for about three months. In the interview, he told ushow he was impressed by the natural environment inTibet, but shocked by the harsh living conditions and theagricultural slave system.When Yuan Daoxian returned from Tibet in 1957, he wasasked to stay in the Ministry of Geology in Beijing and to doofﬁce work, but he preferred ﬁeldwork. The project thatbecame his ﬁrst professional contact with karst was related tothe siting of dams for hydropower along a large tributary ofthe Yangtze River: “I was very impressed by the karst alongWujiang River. There are a lot of gorges and big karst springsalong the river. The concern was that underground streamsaround dam sites might lead to serious leakage problems. Sowe did a lot of survey of karstic features, such as dolines,caves, springs and so on, to make feasible selection of damsites and hydropower stations. This was the ﬁrst time I wasquite involved in karst research. It took us three monthsReceived: 14 December 2007 /Accepted: 27 May 2008Published online: 9 July 2008* Springer-Verlag 2008Electronic supplementary material The online version of thisarticle (doi:10.1007/s10040-008-0328-8) contains supplementarymaterial, which is available to authorized users.N. Goldscheider ())Centre of Hydrogeology (CHYN),University of Neuchâtel,Rue Emile-Argand 11, 2009, Neuchâtel, Switzerlande-mail: nico.goldscheider@unine.chTel.: +41-32-7182645W. YuexiaSchool of Geographical Sciences,Southwest University, 400715, Chongqing, ChinaP. BakerDepartment of Geology/Geography,Western Kentucky University,1906 College Heights Blvd., Bowling Green, KY 42101, USAHydrogeology Journal (2008) 16: 1455–1457 DOI 10.1007/s10040-008-0328-8walking in the karst region, 20 km per day, with poorconditions, no highway, no hotel; we lived in farmers’houses. We were a comprehensive team composed of sevenpeople in all, (experienced in) hydro-engineering, geology,navigation.”Afterward, he was appointed the chief of a hydro-geological team in Shandong Province, a region with a lotof karst, where he investigated groundwater resources,drilled boreholes and helped to solve water shortageproblems.From the cultural revolution to his ﬁrsthydrogeology textbookDuring the Cultural Revolution, which ofﬁcially lastedfrom 1966 to 1969 but only actually ended in 1976, manyintellectuals and academics were removed from theirpositions to work as farmers on the countryside. Whenwe talked with Yuan Daoxian about this time, he said, “Iwas lucky, I was just asked to go to the rural area to helppeople to ﬁnd water”. So again, he moved fromadministrative work to more practical work. This includedhydrogeological investigations and challenging caving inorder to ﬁnd underground streams that could be exploitedas drinking water sources for the local people.“I tried to collect methods from experiences of localpeople to ﬁnd water. For example, they told us how toidentify ﬁsh species, and about the relationship betweenthe quantity of ﬁsh and cavities in the underground.Because they also fed their cattle in karst mountains, theyhad much knowledge on which entrance had morepossible connections with underground streams. I learneda lot from the farmers. I collected this knowledge andwrote a book summarising all the experiences of thefarmers, together with some technologies that the farmersdid not know.”Karst Hydrogeology for Water Supply, Yuan Daoxian’sﬁrst textbook, was published in 1979 and is highly read inschools, universities, and geological bureaus in karstregions of China as a handbook, but is now out of print(Yuan 1979).The opening of China and the step to internationalkarst researchWhen Deng Xiaoping took leadership in 1979, Chinastarted to open to the world. Yuan Daoxian was among theﬁrst who contributed to this opening in the ﬁeld of karstand hydrogeology. Shortly before this he was appointeddirector of the newly established Institute of KarstGeology in Guilin, situated in the middle of a world-famous tower-karst landscape. His ﬁrst trip outside ofChina was to France in 1981. There he met Henri Paloc,president of the IAH Karst Commission, and WilliamBack from the US Geological Survey. They visited Frenchkarst aquifer systems and experimental sites and YuanDaoxian became the ﬁrst Chinese member of the KarstCommission. This was also the starting point of intenseand manifold exchange between Chinese and Americankarst researchers. During a conference of the AmericanAssociation for the Advancement of Science in 1983 inDetroit, Yuan Daoxian gave a keynote lecture in which hedrew the attention of the scientiﬁc community to theenvironmental and hydrogeological problems in China.Afterwards William Back took him on a long expeditionto many important karst regions of the US, such asMammoth Cave in Kentucky.This ‘scientiﬁc opening policy’ also resulted inseveral books: Glossary of Karst Geology (Yuan 1988a,Chinese with English indices); The Science of KarstEnvironment (Yuan 1988b), which was written in Chinesebut considers international concepts; and the ﬁrst interna-tional textbook on the Karst of China (Yuan 1991). Hisinternational journal articles also focus on environmentalproblems in karst regions (Yuan 1988c) or present resultsfrom hydrogeological experimental sites near Guilin(Yuan et al. 1990).Another signiﬁcant outcome of his indefatigable effortsto foster exchange between China and the rest of the worldis the organisation of the 21st IAH Congress, which tookplace in 1988 in Guilin. More than 500 people attended thiscongress and participated in several excursions.International hydrogeological, ecologicaland climate change researchIn continuation of his international scientiﬁc coordinationefforts, Yuan Daoxian headed or co-headed four projectsFig. 1 Yuan Daoxian during the Karst Hydrogeology Workshop inOctober 2007, explaining the geology of the Qing Muguan karst testsite near Chongqing, where he also lived as a schoolboy (photo: N.Goldscheider)1456Hydrogeology Journal (2008) 16: 1455–1457 DOI 10.1007/s10040-008-0328-8within the International Geoscience Programme (formerlyInternational Geological Correlation Programme) (IGCP)of UNESCO:– IGCP 299: Geology, climate, hydrology and karstformation (1990–1994)– IGCP 379: Karst processes and the carbon cycle(1995–1999)– IGCP 448: World correlation of karst ecosystems(2000–2004)– IGCP 513: Global study of karst aquifers and waterresources (since 2005)It is noteworthy that these projects focus on topics thatwere only recently fully recognised as important issues bythe hydrogeology community such as the relationshipbetween groundwater environments and climate change,and an ecosystems approach to hydrogeology. Thiscooperation framework, along with national researchgrants, resulted in major scientiﬁc insights such as thereconstruction of the Last Interglacial Asian monsoon bymeans of absolute dating and oxygen isotope ratios,published in Science (Yuan et al. 2004).Other relevant publications include a general conceptu-alisation of the karst dynamics system and its role withinthe global carbon cycle (Yuan 1997); a holistic apprecia-tion of the karst ecosystem (Yuan 2001); new insights intothe relationship between the hydrological and geologicalenvironment and human health in China (Yuan 2002); andjoint publications with American colleagues about karstaquifer storm-scale hydrochemistry (Liu et al. 2004).Working on the resolutions of China’senvironmental problemsThe research described in the last section also preparedground for the “China Environmental Health Project”,coordinated by Chris Groves from Western KentuckyUniversity and supported by the US Agency for Interna-tional Development (USAID) since 2007. The projectaims to improve the living conditions of the population insouthwest Chinese karst regions by improving access tosafe drinking water and protecting the environmentalintegrity of valuable karst groundwater resources.“Karst problems are very complicated. In my under-standing about karst aquifers, the most important aspect isheterogeneity. The problem has not been solved yet: Howto estimate, how to exploit karst water resources and howto avoid pollution? The 3,000 underground streams ofsouthwest China need to be protected, because thesituation is getting worse. That is why I gave a specialreport to the State Council to call our attention on how toprotect them. However, solving such problems is not easy.It needs scientiﬁc knowledge and encouraging the localpeople’s participation, and education.”Other environmental problems, on which Yuan Daox-ian and his research teams in Guilin and Chongqing areworking, include soil erosion and rock desertiﬁcation, andthe identiﬁcation of better land-use practices that can stopor prevent this largely irreversible process. They areresearching the cultivation of plants that are economicallybeneﬁcial but do not require the soil to be ploughed,including medicinal herbs and woody plants. This goesalong with fundamental research on soil ecology andmicrobiology (e.g. Li et al. 2005).Yuan Daoxian explained that he considers research,education, and international cooperation keys to solvingthe serious environmental problems of China, a convictionhe passes along to his students: “At present, I think myimportant job is to train the young people, to transfer theplatform to the younger generation.” And everyone whohas experienced the spirit at the institutes in Chongqingand Guilin feels that his students are on a good path.A recent success of his efforts is the creation of a newInternational Research Center of Karst (IRCK) under theAuspices of UNESCO, which will be established in Guilinin 2008. The focus of this institute will be on hydro-geology; so much more exchange between Chinese andinternational karst hydrogeologists can be expected in thenear future.ReferencesLi W, Yu LJ, Yuan DX, Wu Y, Zeng XD (2005) A study of theactivity and ecological signiﬁcance of carbonic anhydrase fromsoil and its microbes from different karst ecosystems ofsouthwest China. Eurasian Soil Sci 38(8):880–886Liu ZH, Groves C, Yuan DX, Meiman J (2004) South China karstaquifer storm-scale hydrochemistry. Ground Water 42(4):491–499Yuan DX (1979) Karst hydrogeology for water supply. GeologicalPublishing House, Beijing, 358 pp, (in Chinese)Yuan DX (1988a) Glossary of Karst Geology. Geological Publish-ing House, Beijing, (in Chinese, with English indices)Yuan DX (1988b) The Science of Karst environment . ChongqingPublishing House, Chongqing, 332 pp, (in Chinese, withEnglish abstract)Yuan DX (1988c) Environmental and engineering problems of karstgeology in China. Environ Geol Water Sci 12(2):79–87Yuan DX (1991) Karst of China. Geological Publishing House,Beijing, 224 ppYuan DX (1997) The carbon cycle in karst. Z Geomorphol 108(suppl):91–102Yuan DX (2001) On the karst ecosystem. Acta Geol Sin (Engl. edn.)75(3):336–338Yuan DX (2002) Geologic environments and human health inChina. Environ Health Perspect 110(9):A500Yuan DX, Drogue C, Dai A, Lao WK, Cai WT, Bidaux P, RazackM (1990) Hydrology of the karst aquifer at the experimental siteof Guilin in southern China. J Hydrol 115(1–4):285–296Yuan DX, Cheng H, Edwards RL, Dykoski CA, Kelly MJ, ZhangML, Qing JM, Lin YS, Wang YJ, Wu JY, Dorale JA, An ZS,Cai YJ (2004) Timing, duration, and transitions of the LastInterglacial Asian Monsoon. Science 304(5670):575–5781457Hydrogeology Journal (2008) 16: 1455–1457 DOI 10.1007/s10040-008-0328-8

Yuan Daoxian: an interview with a distinguished hydrogeologist from China

http://doc.rero.ch/record/319803/files/10040_2008_Article_328.pdf

Yuan Daoxian: an interview with a distinguished hydrogeologist from China

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

RERO DOC Digital Library