The Zhejiang Provincial Water Resources Department has released the list of 117 international green small hydropower stations in 2020 in East China's Zhejiang province, some 23 of which are from Jingning She autonomous county administered by the prefecture-level city of Lishui, according to local officials.

They said 31 hydropower stations have been upgraded into green small hydropower stations in Jingning, ranking first in the province.

Jingning, located in the mountainous area of southern Zhejiang, is rich in hydropower resources. It was called the first "Rural Hydropower Town in China" and the annual output of rural small hydropower stations is one billion kilowatt hours, with an output value of nearly 500 million yuan ($74.02 million).

Since work on cleaning and rectification of small hydropower stations was carried out in the Yangtze River Economic Belt in January 2019, Jingning has tailored plans for the renovation of 161 hydropower stations across the whole region.

The county has discontinued 10 power stations and upgraded 151 power stations. Officials said that by the end of July 2020, the renovation work and upgrading had been completed in an all-round way.