As spring progresses, major national projects are advancing rapidly, reinforcing China's push toward high-quality, green economic development. The Shenzhen-Jiangmen High-Speed Railway, a key segment of the national "eight vertical and eight horizontal" high-speed rail network, is currently in a critical shield tunneling phase. The Pearl River Estuary Tunnel, an undersea shield tunnel for high-speed trains, saw construction teams working through the Qingming holiday. The domestically developed large-diameter shield machine, "Shenjiang-1," continues its non-stop excavation deep beneath the sea.
Inside the "Shenjiang-1" shield machine, located 113 meters below sea level, the noise of cutting through rock and soil is constant. The machine advances over two meters per day on average. After more than four years of continuous operation, it has tunneled over four kilometers, reaching a record depth of 116 meters below the seabed—the deepest underwater high-speed rail tunnel in the world. At this depth, the shield withstands water pressure equivalent to 11.3 bar, or the weight of about 80 cars per square meter.
The geology traversed by "Shenjiang-1" is highly complex, involving 13 different soil layers, five composite geological formations, and six fault zones. The shield machine operates like a "steel giant," with its front cutterhead—equipped with numerous cutting tools—grinding through rock and soil. Two pipelines manage the excavated material: one delivers thinner slurry to lubricate the cutterhead, while the other transports thicker, soil-laden slurry to a treatment plant on the surface for separation and reuse.
Behind the cutterhead, workers operate a segment erector, assembling pre-cast tunnel segments nearly two meters wide into rings to form the 13-meter-diameter tunnel. This "excavate and assemble" method significantly speeds up construction. An onboard control room serves as the "brain" of the operation, allowing real-time monitoring and adjustment of the machine’s direction, angle, and operational parameters.
The Pearl River Estuary Tunnel, spanning 13.69 kilometers between Dongguan and Guangzhou, is a critical component of the 116-kilometer Shenzhen-Jiangmen High-Speed Railway. Once completed, it will greatly shorten travel times between western Guangdong, southwestern regions, and major hubs like Guangzhou and Shenzhen, boosting regional economic integration.
During the Qingming holiday, over 7,000 workers continued construction on the Shenzhen-Jiangmen Railway, while more than 14,000 were engaged in the Pinglu Canal, a key western land-sea corridor project. The Pinglu Canal, now over 93% complete, is expected to be fully navigable by September. Stretching 134.2 kilometers, it will allow 5,000-ton vessels to travel along the shortest and most economical route linking Guangxi and southwestern China with ASEAN nations.
Meanwhile, the Sichuan-East Gas Pipeline Phase II project is accelerating along an 1,180-point construction front across eight provinces, including Hubei and Anhui. With overall progress reaching 35%, the pipeline is slated to begin phased operation in the second half of 2027.
In Ningxia, photovoltaic power generation has entered its peak season. A 500-megawatt "source-grid-load-storage" solar project in Zhongwei is now generating over two million kilowatt-hours daily, supplying green power directly to a nearby data center via a dedicated line. This arrangement is expected to save the data center more than 200 million yuan annually in electricity costs. In line with China’s green energy and computing integration strategy, the Zhongwei data center hub will eventually draw 2.29 billion kilowatt-hours of green electricity yearly from 200 megawatts of new energy sources, including 150 megawatts of wind power under construction.
In environmental restoration efforts, the Taklimakan Desert marginal greening project has been launched. In Hotan, Xinjiang, bulldozers are leveling sand dunes to prepare the ground for mechanized afforestation. Using dual-track tree-planting machines guided by BeiDou navigation, workers can plant over 13,000 saplings per day—ten times more efficient than traditional methods. The initiative also incorporates intercropping with forage crops like alfalfa, maximizing land use in reclaimed desert areas. This year, Hotan aims to restore over 223,000 hectares of desertified land, including nearly 16,000 hectares of spring planting.
From undersea tunnels and energy pipelines to solar farms and desert greening, these projects reflect a coordinated national effort toward sustainable and innovative growth this spring.
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