The Office for the Four Major Rivers Restoration announced that it will carry out a project to use IT technology in river restoration, especially in securing water resources, controlling floods, improving water quality and ecosystem and developing multi-use areas around the rivers.
Firstly, it will set up an infrastructure for water resource information to respond to extreme weather events that will be caused by water scarcity and climate change inthe future. To this end, the river flow management system will be improved for better identification of real-time water quantity and usage and the existing 2-dimensional river topographical information management system will be transformed into a 3-dimentional one. The water resource management information system that is currently provided to the public will have more information on the four rivers.
Secondly, it will establish an infrastructure to preemptively respond to frequent floods.
To this end, the existing flood warning system will be used for 16 weirs and 96 agricultural reservoirs that are currently under construction. It will create a river facility safety system and an alarming system that provide information on natural disasters and reduce preventable accidents.
Thirdly, the Ministry of Environment, the Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs and the Ministry of Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries will jointly cooperate to preserve water quality and ecosystem. They will create a water quality monitoring system that measures the water quality of 16 weirs as well as a system that prevents algae bloom in the four rivers. Furthermore, underwater fish robots will be developed for aquanautics and monitoring.
Lastly, the Office will develop water fronts and a digital tour system to provide information to river visitors and revitalize local economies. It will also install Solar LED trees for better night view and an optical communications network to meet the future demand of communications around rivers.
The Office will spend about 115 billion won in this project and start it from this year to finish it by 2012. It is expected that the project will help operate rivers more efficiently, prevent floods and other natural disasters and thereby significantly improve people's living standard.
