ZTE Corporation, in collaboration with China Mobile and Sanjiangyuan National Park, recently implemented 5G coverage in Kekexili (Hoh Xil) Nature Reserve located in Qinghai Province, China. Kekexili holds the distinction of being the highest altitude World Natural Heritage site at over 4,500 meters above sea level. This vast uninhabited region within the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau is renowned for its abundant wildlife resources and serves as a crucial refuge for numerous endemic species that evolved to thrive in its extreme high-altitude environment.

Tibetan antelope, an endemic species on the Plateau, once came close to extinction in the last century due to poaching. Zhuonai Lake, located in the heart of Kekexili, is renowned as the “Tibetan antelope maternity ward”. Every year from May to July, tens of thousands of female Tibetan antelopes undertake long migrations to the shores of Zhuonai Lake to give birth to their young. As a result, the Zhuonai Lake protection station serves as a vital observation and relay point for protecting Tibetan antelopes. 

For years,  the staff working at the protection station was required to conduct extended patrols in the area to protect the antelopes. The traditional patrols relied on satellite phones, which left the staff disconnected for long periods of time. This lack of connectivity posed challenges to ensuring personal safety and presented numerous inconveniences in the execution of patrol duties.

Local patrol personnel usually work in a very tough environment, such as severe cold, strong wind, anoxic altitude sickness. But the most challenge thing they were experiencing was the fact that they were completely isolated from the outside world when they patrol or camp in the national park, because there was no telecommunication base station providing mobile coverage in the area. Also, most areas lacked communication network coverage with ecological monitoring sensor data relying on manual collection.

In early May, the deployment of the 5G base station at Zhuonai Lake Protection Station commenced. The engineering part of the project was successfully completed in less than one month, with the first video call within this vast uninhabited area, ZTE said.

The 5G base station at Zhuonai Lake uses two frequency bands to achieve a balance between coverage and capacity. The 700 MHz band, combined with 5G ultra-long-range coverage technology, covers a radius of over 10 kilometers, with a single base station covering the entire Zhuonai Lake region. Additionally, the 2.6 GHz band enables support for 32 high-definition video uploads, meeting the high bandwidth requirements for HD video around the protection station. 

ZTE also explained that the base station transmission utilizes wide bandwidth and long-distance microwave relay, allowing for a single hop span of over 57 kilometers. Furthermore, all equipment at the site is powered by solar energy and is also engineered to operate with temperatures as low as -50°C.

Extending China’s 5G network coverage to uninhabited areas to support environmental protection has long been a goal for China Mobile. According to Hu Bo, general manager of China Mobile’s Qinghai Branch, the maximum internet transmission speeds around the protection station currently reach 860Mbps. Additionally, the deployment of 5G technology opens up possibilities for future environmental protection, ecological monitoring, scientific expeditions and changes in the management of protected areas.

Hu stressed that 5G technology enables real-time observation of Tibetan antelope births, ensuring crucial wildlife monitoring.

ZTE explained that the 5G network enabled improvements in basic communication and mobile internet for staff members. And the 5G technology is enabling the implementation of a unified ecological monitoring platform to supports wildlife video monitoring and protection, protection station security communication management, ecological environment monitoring and scientific research. This deployment will transform daily patrolsreal-time video monitoring, with ecological monitoring sensor data transforming from manual periodic collection to 5G real-time data collection.

By adopting remote video monitoring in combination with on-site patrol, the patrol workloads in the area can be reduced, while the remote monitoring of the migration of Tibetan antelopes in the Zhuonai lake area could be analyzed through AI. The 5G network, combined with multiple terminals, sensors, cloud platforms and big data analysis systems, will further improve the remote ecological monitoring and analysis, live streaming, and immersive ecological experiences and environmental education using extended reality (XR) technologies..

According to Sun Lijun, Deputy Director of Sanjiangyuan National Park Administration, the deployment of 5G is a crucial step towards achieving smart management of the national park. It will significantly enhance the efficiency of scientific management in national parks and establish a more comprehensive mechanism for protection and research in Kekexili, he said.

The next step is to deploy more 5G base stations at new locations within the Sanjiangyuan National Park area, along with additional video monitoring points, environmental monitoring sensors and enhancements in AI analysis capabilities. The aim is to develop Sanjiangyuana model for ecological conservation both in China and globally. 

This 5G-based solution is widely applicable to 5G wide-area coverage and smart ecological conservation applications in nature reserves. Moving forward, ZTE noted that it plan to scale this solution to new nature reserves across China in the future, generating substantial economic and social value.