下北阳光灿烂的日子

近日，美国财政部长耶伦在接受美国公共媒体经济电台采访时，再次炒作中国在电动汽车、太阳能等领域存在所谓“产能过剩”的言论，遭到主持人的质问。         The 24th group of the low-orbit internet satellites aboard a Long March-12 carrier rocket is launched at 12:10 pm on August 16, 2026 from a commercial spacecraft launch site in the southern island province of Hainan. Photo: VCG
Two successful launches among China's recent frequent moves caught particular attention of space watchers - the 24th group of low-Earth orbit internet (LEO) satellites aboard a Long March-12 rocket was sent from a commercial spacecraft launch site in the southern island province of Hainan on Sunday, 12 days after the 23rd group of LEO satellites aboard a Long March-8A rocket was launched from the same Hainan site on August 4.
Sunday's mission marked the 663rd launch of the Long March series of carrier rockets, which on Monday sent an SEO satellite into preset orbit, per Xinhua.
Experts said the launches of two groups of LEO satellites within 12 days underlined that China is notably accelerating its pace of building its satellite internet constellation.
"The launch of LEO satellites has now entered a regular and cyclical rhythm, with batches of satellites continuously being sent into orbit at relatively stable intervals," Kang Guohua, a senior member of the Chinese Society of Astronautics and a professor of Aerospace Engineering at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, told the Global Times on Monday.
China launched the first group of LEO internet satellites on December 16, 2024, proceeding to the 24th batch in about 20 months. Kang said three major production and launch "assembly lines" are supporting the effort: satellite factories featuring centralized design in Beijing, coordinated supply chains and mass production; rockets with streamlined launch and testing procedures and multiple configurations; and launch sites capable of supporting routine constellation deployment.
The Long March-12, which played a key role in the latest LEO satellite launch, is China's first 4-meter-class single-core-stage carrier rocket and was specifically developed for commercial launch needs. It is about 62.6 meters long, has a liftoff mass of 430 tons and can carry more than 12 tons to low-Earth orbit. Its first stage is equipped with four 1,250-kilonewton pump-fed liquid oxygen-kerosene engines and uses a newly developed coal-based aerospace kerosene, according to Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology.
The rocket adopts a "three-horizontal" launch preparation model: horizontal assembly, horizontal testing and horizontal transportation. Depending on mission requirements, it can use fairings with diameters of 4.2 or 5.2 meters and support both single-satellite and multi-satellite launches into different orbits.
"This flexibility makes the Long March-12 particularly suitable for the 'one rocket, multiple satellites' model required for constellation deployment, making it one of the main launch vehicles currently used for LEO constellation missions," Kang said.
The mission also highlighted the launch site's growing ability to support high-frequency launches. The rocket took only two and a half days from being transported to the launch area to liftoff, setting a record for the shortest time a rocket occupied the launch position at the site, Kang said.
Despite the rapid progress, experts cautioned that the 228 satellites currently in orbit remain some distance from the ultimate goal. China's satellite internet project has a long-term goal of deploying nearly 8,000 satellites and is now in an accelerated "weaving" phase.
China's advantage lies in its ability to control costs and boost production efficiency once satellite manufacturing reaches mass-production scale, another expert surnamed Liu told the Global Times.
"Whether it is the production capacity of AI centers or the factory in Hainan, which has an annual satellite manufacturing capacity of 1,000 units, satellite production itself is not the problem," Liu said. "More bottlenecks lie in the operational efficiency of launch pads and the rocket payload and recovery technology."
The real challenge lies in rocket reusability. Only by lowering launch costs and increasing launch frequency can China sustain a pace of more than one launch per week. This is also the strategic significance of accelerating the development of reusable rocket technology, including the Long March-10B and privately developed rockets, Kang further noted.
Chinese Academy of Engineering academician Deng Zhongliang previously said in an interview that satellite internet will serve as an indispensable space-time infrastructure for 6G, enabling emerging industries worth trillions of yuan, including the low-altitude economy, advanced autonomous driving and the Internet of Things (IoT).
    The 23rd group of low-orbit internet satellites aboard a Long March-8A carrier rocket is launched on August 4, 2026 from a commercial spacecraft launch site in the southern island province of Hainan. Photo: VCG
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美国电台主持人 凯·雷斯达尔：我想问您关于这次访问的重点之一，您提到过的电动汽车、电池，这些先进产品产能过剩的问题。有没有可能，我们只是在这些领域被中国打败了？

美国财政部长 耶伦：我们不认为（双方的）竞争是公平的。我们认为，中国向他们认为对经济发展至关重要的领域大规模提供补贴。

美国电台主持人 凯·雷斯达尔：难道他们的补贴，比我们的芯片法案和《通胀削减法案》提供的补贴还要多吗？我们（美国）可是投入了数十亿美元，你们（美国政府）投入了数十亿美元。

2022年8月，《通胀削减法案》经美国总统拜登签署成法，允许发放约3690亿美元补贴，试图通过高额补贴推动电动汽车及其他绿色技术在美国本土生产和应用。几乎同期成法的《芯片与科学法案》也划拨约500亿美元，刺激美国国内半导体生产，试图通过巨额产业补贴和遏制竞争的霸道条款，推动芯片制造“回流”本土。

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德国伊弗经济研究所报告说，美方做法给德国带来“去工业化”威胁，德国工业结构将受到损害。韩国京畿大学国际产业信息学教授金周焕表示，《通胀削减法案》和《芯片与科学法案》都透露出美国霸权思维本色。