“…In addition to exploiting its abundant coal reserves, the Chinese government also plans to make Xinjiang—desert home to the Uyghur ethnic minority—the center of its oil and gas industry. China National Petroleum Corporation will spend nearly US$30 billion in the province by 2020, with a goal of increasing production capacity more than 60 percent, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Going hand-in-hand with energy development is urban growth, driven in part by national governmental policy. In 1999, China launched the Go West campaign to balance the country’s economic growth and increase the proportion of Han Chinese in areas with restive ethnic minorities.

Yet one barrier to all this growth is water. Xinjiang has few local water sources, and even those are complicated by international politics. The Irtysh River and the Ili River originate in Xinjiang, before flowing through Kazakhstan and Russia—both of which are concerned about China’s use of the rivers.”