The idea of a dam at the Three Gorges of the Yangtze goes back to Sun Yat-sen’s Plan for National Reconstruction, published in 1919. Seventy-three years later, on April 3, 1992, the National People’s Congress approved the project. The vote was 1,767 in favor, 177 against and 664 abstentions. Twenty-five delegates did not press the voting button.