Jinghe County

The Jinghe (Jing) County (Uyghur: جىڭ ناھىيىسى‎, ULY: Jing Nahiyisi, UYY: Jing Nah̡iyisi^?; simplified Chinese: 精河县; traditional Chinese: 精河縣; pinyin: Jīnghé Xiàn) is a county of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region and is under the administration of the Börtala Mongol Autonomous Prefecture. It contains an area of 11,181 square kilometres (4,317 sq mi). According to the 2002 census, it has a population of 120,000.

Geography and climate

Jinghe has a desert climate (Köppen BWk), with a mean total of only 102 millimetres (4.02 in) of precipitation per annum and great seasonal differences in temperature, with long, very cold winters, and hot, dry summers. As spring and autumn are short, winter and summer are the main seasons. Temperatures can easily fall below −20 °C (−4 °F) in winter or rise above 35 °C (95 °F) in summer. The monthly 24-hour average temperature ranges from −15.2 °C (4.6 °F) in January to 25.5 °C (77.9 °F) in July; the annual mean is 7.78 °C (46.0 °F). With monthly percent possible sunshine ranging from 35% in December to 70% in August and September, the county receives 2,554 hours of bright sunshine annually.