China Bullet Train
© Getty ImagesCRH2 China Railways High-speed bullet train as it arrives from Hangzhou, at the Shanghai South Railway Station.

A model Maglev train that can travel as fast as a plane has been successfully developed in a laboratory in Southwest China, but putting the technology to use is still a long way away, an official from the lab told the Global Times Sunday.

Under research conducted by the Traction Power State Key Laboratory at the Southwest Jiaotong University, the vacuum magnetic suspension train model was able to run at between 600 and 1,200 kilometers per hour, equal to the speed of a plane, according to Shuai Bin, vice dean of the university's Traffic School.

The new technology is expected to be put into operation within 10 years and promoted across the country in 2030, the Shanghai-based Science Pictorial reported Sunday.

Passengers will be able to travel from Beijing to Guangzhou in under two hours. A flight from the capital to Guangzhou takes three hours.

However, Shuai told the Global Times Sunday that the possibility of the technology being put to use is small.

"It's just an experimental success. Its actual value is slim as there is a great gulf in adopting it for practical use," he said.

The technology, now being researched in just two other countries - the US and Switzerland - theoretically allows trains to run in vacuum tubes at speeds of up to 20,000 kilometers per hour, according to Science Pictorial.

The report cited a number of other advantages: the technology would use just one-tenth of the fuel that a plane does, and emit almost zero noise.

"All those advantages are just bubbles before a new transport system of vacuum tubes is built across the country, and the cost would be astronomical," Shuai said, adding that the cost for one kilometer of vacuum tube would be several times higher than that of a subway, which costs over 200 million yuan ($30 million).

The technology only has an experimental significance and is not currently feasible due to its astronomical costs, he said.

Wang Mengshu, a professor at the Beijing Jiaotong University, was skeptical about the technology.

"Developing a vacuum Maglev train is a complete scientific fantasy. It is impossible to develop a vacuum Maglev train at a speed of 20,000 kilometers per hour technically and economically," Wang told the Global Times, adding that it was very dangerous for people to take a train in a vacuum state at an average speed of more than 350 kilometers per hour.