Qaidam

• Tsaidam

A romanization of Tibetan ཚྭའི་འདམ (tshwa'i 'dam), from ཚྭ (tshwa, “salt”) + འི ('i, possessive particle) + འདམ ('dam, “marsh, swamp, morass”)

Qaidam

1. An arid basin of the northeastern Tibetan Plateau covered with deserts and salt flats, making up most of northwestern Qinghai Province, China.
   • 1990, Salt Diapirs of the Great Kavir, Central Iran‎, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 134:

     No salt diapirs are exposed in Qaidam. But given the close similarity of Landsat images of the Kavir and Qaidam basins, the subsurface role of halokinesis or halotectonics in the Qaidam basin has probably been underestimated.

   • 2022 March 29, Chen, Aizhu, “PetroChina taps shale oil in ageing western China field”, in Edmund Blair, editor, Reuters‎, archived from the original on 29 March 2022:

     The state giant started drilling four horizontal wells in Yingxiongling in Qinghai oilfield, part of the Qaidam basin in western province of Qinghai where oil exploration began in the 1950s, Petrochina's parent company CNPC said on Tuesday.

2. A river in the basin.