The first two 1 GW generators have come online at China’s Baihetan Hydropower Station, with the whole 16 GW project to be complete next July. Equivalent by itself to a quarter of France’s power capacity, and with an expected 44.5% capacity factor, Baihetan is the second-largest hydropower power plant in the world, surpassed only by the 22.5 GW Three Gorges Dam. Unlike the Three Gorges Dam, which is situated near the center of China’s densely populated heartland, Baihetan Hydropower Station is on the Jinsha River, and straddles the border of Sichuan and Yunnan – the two exceptionally mountainous provinces just east of Tibet. Three Gorges Corporation built both of these giants; the Corporation is responsible for five of the top…