More than 150 experts and scholars from seven countries and regions Sunday gathered in Lanzhou, capital of northwest China's Gansu Province, to exchange experiences on building projects on earth that has frozen for a long period of time.
They are here attending the three-day sixth International Meeting on Permafrost Projects, which opened on Sunday. The meeting was sponsored by the Glacier and Permafrost Institute of China Geography Society.
Topics to be discussed will also include new achievements and scientific difficulties in building permafrost projects and ways to solve them.
The experts and scholars are expected to make an on-the-spot investigation at the Qinghai-Tibet railway construction sites in Xining, capital of northwest China's Qinghai Province, Golmud, also in Qinghai, and Nagqu and Lhasa in Tibet Autonomous Region.
The Qinghai-Tibet railway runs for 1,142 kilometers from Golmudto Lhasa, capital of Tibet, and is the most elevated railway in the world. A 960-kilometer-long section of the railway runs through areas with an elevation of over 4,000 meters, and 550 kilometers of the railway are built on earth that has frozen for along period of time.
Construction of the railway project has progressed smoothly since it began in June 2001, said Sun Yongfu, vice-minister of Railways, at the international meeting on permafrost projects.
Currently, more than 90 percent of bridges and tunnels on the railway have been completed and rails have been laid on more than 580 kilometers of the railway, said Sun, who is also deputy head of China's leading group in charge of Qinghai-Tibet railway construction.
Building railways on permafrost areas is a difficult problem that many countries around the world are facing, Sun said, adding that he believed the current meeting would play a significant role in promoting research on permafrost science and improving engineering technologies for building such projects.
The first international meeting on permafrost projects was jointly initiated by China and Russia in 1993.
(Xinhua News Agency September 6, 2004)
