Project Guanlan, meaning "watching the big waves," was launched in May at the Pilot National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology in Qingdao, a city in eastern Shandong Province on the east coast of China, said South China Morning Post.

It is an ambitious project that the US and Russia have failed to acquire fully. China aims to boost its surveillance activities in the South China Sea, East China Sea, Yellow Sea, Sea of Japan, and the Phillippine Sea, according to the laboratory's website.

Researchers are currently working on the satellite's design at the laboratory, but its lasers and internal components are being developed by 20 research institutes and universities across the country.

Song Xiaoquan, a researcher involved in the project, said if the program is successful, it will enable China to surveil the upper layer of the Ocean.

"It will change almost everything," Song said.