A major water conservancy project officially supplies water to Macao special administrative region after a grand opening ceremony was held in Zhuhai special economic zone of Guangdong province on Thursday. [Photo by Zeng Wenfan / for chinadaily.com.cn]

A major water conservancy project that provides drinking water to Macao was officially completed and began supplying water to the Chinese special administrative region after a grand opening ceremony was held in Zhuhai special economic zone of South China's Guangdong province on Thursday.

The project that includes a 15-kilometer-long water pipeline and a water pump station will help increase Guangdong's water supply capacity to Macao to 700,000 cubic meters a day, according to a statement released by the Guangdong Provincial Department of Water Resources on Thursday.

Previously Guangdong supplied no more than 500,000 cubic meters of water to Macao a day.

Project construction began in 2016 and cost more than 525 million yuan ($75 million), the statement said.

It is the fourth water supply pipeline to Macao and has great significance in ensuring and increasing the capacity of Zhuhai's water supply to Macao, according to the statement.

The project plays a big part in advancing cooperation between Guangdong and Macao and boosting the construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, the statement added.

The Greater Bay Area includes the nine major Pearl River delta cities of Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Foshan, Dongguan, Huizhou, Zhongshan, Huizhou and Zhaoqing in Guangdong province and the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions.

Zhuhai has been supplying water to Macao for six decades.

The city started constructing two special reservoirs to supply water to Macao at the request of Macao residents in 1959. And the two reservoirs officially began supplying water to Macao in 1960.