Several express trucks carrying fresh fruits on Saturday started a journey from northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, making a direct trip to Almaty, Kazakhstan, capitalizing on the expedited customs clearance privileges.
This express line employs high-performance large trucks for seamless cross-border transportation of goods. In accordance with the "International Convention on the Harmonization of Frontier Controls of Goods" guidelines, the goods on the trucks can be dispatched from the originating warehouse and delivered to the destination warehouse without customs inspections or container openings along the route, thereby significantly reducing clearance time and transportation costs.
In this mode, customs officials handle the consolidation, loading, and inspection procedures for the exported produce at a fruit and vegetable wholesale market located in Xinjiang. Once these vehicles reach the Horgos Port, a major border junction in Xinjiang connecting China and Central Asia, they can proceed directly to Kazakhstan without further delays.
This streamlined and efficient cross-border transportation process means much lower cost for exporters.
"For our merchants, this is a significant advantage as it reduces transportation time. Previously, going through the port procedures would add an extra day to the transit. But the express trucking mode saves a day of transportation time and eliminates the need for two transshipments. Merchants can now complete all relevant customs procedures here in one go, providing them with great convenience and benefiting their business tremendously," said Zhou Kai, person in charge of the wholesale market for agricultural products.
In the past, the transportation process of exporting fruits and vegetables from key markets in Xinjiang to Central Asia involved transporting the goods to ports for inspection and customs clearance. This procedure not only consumed a significant amount of time but also led to substantial losses of perishable produce.
However, the fresh customs clearance mode is now establishing a door-to-door transportation system with Central Asian countries. This streamlined approach has reduced the transportation time sharply by more than 50 percent, while also minimizing goods loss by around 3 percent.
Xinjiang's fruits make inaugural journey on express trucks to central Asian market
Xinjiang's fruits make inaugural journey on express trucks to central Asian market
Major breakthroughs by Chinese scientists have laid the foundation for a future where space-based solar power stations are capable of wirelessly transmitting energy to Earth and spacecraft, though significant engineering problems remain.
A research team from Xidian University in northwest China's Shaanxi Province has made significant progress on the Sun Chasing project, or "Zhuri" in Chinese. The team has developed a ground-based test system for wireless power transmission that can charge multiple moving targets at the same time.
In recent tests, the system achieved a wireless power transmission efficiency of 20.8 percent from direct current to direct current over a distance of 100 meters. It delivered 1,180 watts of power. The team has also built a wireless charging system for drones. In a test, a drone flying at 30 kilometers per hour was able to receive 143 watts of stable power from 30 meters away.
A space solar power station works exactly as its name suggests: a huge array of solar panels placed in orbit. It would collect sunlight in space, where the sun always shines, and then convert that energy into microwaves or lasers to beam down to Earth or directly to satellites and spacecraft. This could address two significant issues: supplying uninterrupted power for space missions and alleviating energy shortages on the ground.
"The construction of space solar power stations could become a major undertaking in the future. One potential benefit is access to a virtually unlimited power supply. Because energy can be collected continuously in space 24 hours a day, electricity could be supplied on an uninterrupted basis," said Fan Guanheng, an associate professor at the School of Mechano-Electronic Engineering at Xidian University.
"Secondly, it could reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, thereby lowering carbon emissions and helping protect the environment. Thirdly, it could support the development of charging infrastructure in space and enable wireless microwave charging for spacecraft, changing the way power is supplied to space vehicles," the professor added.
In 2018, the research team launched the first phase of the Sun Chasing project to build a ground test system. By June 2022, they had completed the world's first full-link, full-system ground validation system for a space solar power station. Now, the team has moved to phase two. The goal now is to solve the challenges of generating high power in space and transmitting it efficiently over long distances.
According to Duan Baoyan, an expert at Xidian University and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, recent breakthroughs include improving the efficiency of solar energy collection and conversion, increasing the precision of microwave beam control to reduce energy loss, and making the transmitting and receiving antennas smaller and lighter, which is critical for space application.
The team has also solved the problem of how to power multiple moving targets at once using a single transmitter. This means that in the future, one space power station could potentially supply electricity to several satellites or ground vehicles at the same time, Duan said.
Despite the advances in ground-based validation, a series of technical challenges must still be overcome before the technology can be deployed in space.
"The first issue that needs to be addressed is the adaptability of components to the space environment, as conditions in space are completely different from those on Earth, including radiation exposure and extreme temperatures. Another challenge involves the deployment and retraction design of transmitting and receiving antennas. We also need to develop thermal management systems to cope with extreme temperatures and temperature fluctuations in space. These are all areas where further breakthroughs are needed," said Qian Sihao, an associate professor at the School of Mechano-Electronic Engineering at Xidian University.
"We have now completed the development and validation of a ground-based test system, and our next step is to carry out in-orbit wireless microwave power transmission," Fan said.
With ground validation complete, the team now turns its attention to overcoming the harsh realities of space, aiming to demonstrate in-orbit wireless power transmission and bring the vision of orbital solar energy closer to reality.
Space-to-earth solar power moves closer to reality although hurdles remain: scientists
