Nanning in S China’s Guangxi monitors water quality of rivers with 5G technology

Nanning, capital city of south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region established a 5G-driven automatic water quality monitoring program, which is much more efficient than conventional manual monitoring techniques.

Photo shows a 5G-empowered automatic water sampling site located near a river in Nanning city, south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. (Photo courtesy of China Mobile Communications Corporation Guangxi Branch Co., Ltd.)

Under the program, which is the first of its kind in Guangxi, a total of 11 sampling sites were built along Yongjiang River in the city. According to He Yuting, an official of the bureau of water resources of Nanning, the newly-built sites could automatically collect water samples from the river, test and analyze the samples, and transfer data to a cloud platform in real time, making it more convenient for the bureau to understand the ongoing state of the river.

Thanks to the use of 5G technology, the sampling process can be carried out 24 hours a day non-stop, while in the past manual monitoring would be conducted only once a week, explained Lu Xiongtian, an employee of the Nanning branch of China Mobile Communications Corporation (China Mobile), which is undertaking the program.

Moreover, supported by new technologies including 5G networks, the Internet of Things, and cloud computing, the program is also capable of carrying out multiple other tasks, such as preventing and controlling pollutants in riverways, evaluating the overall water environment and analyzing and sharing relevant data.

The program is based on an existing cloud platform for river management, whose functions go far beyond monitoring water quality. The 5G-empowered platform has collected basic information on 7,790 rivers as well as information on 2,030 of the signboards for river chiefs, who serve as stewards assigned to each waterway to tackle water pollution, having amassed 6,760 separate issues from the river chiefs in addition to those raised by the public, ranging from garbage found in the rivers to cases of wastewater discharge.