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Exploration
Achievements |
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China
abounds with oil-gas resources, holding more than 500
oil-bearing basins. Since 1949, China has made great achievements
in petroleum exploration and development, and extensively
prospected for oil-gas resources in these basins. It was
estimated that China has a total oil resource of 650 -
800 billion barrels; 102 billion barrels being recoverable.
The total gas resource is 1,334-1,873 Tcf; 353 Tcf are
recoverable. By the end of 2001, China has discovered
531 oil fields and 185 gas fields in 150 basins, and has
gained proven oil reserves of 156.2 billion barrels and
residual recoverable oil reserves of 18.3 billion barrels,
and proven gas reserves of 127.9 billion cubic feet (Bcf),
and residual recoverable gas reserves of 53.4 Bcf. |
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Oil-Gas
Resources of China (as at end of 2000)
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| Oil
Resources (in billion barrels) |
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Total
Resources
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Recoverable
Resources
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Accumulated
Proven Reserves
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Residual
Recoverable Reserves
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650
- 800
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102
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156.2
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18.3
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| Gas
Resources |
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Total
Resources (Tcf)
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Recoverable
Resources (Bcf)
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Accumulated
Proven Reserves (Bcf)
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Residual
Recoverable Reserves (Bcf)
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1,334
- 1,873
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353
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127.9
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53.4
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Since
1949, China's crude oil production has grown greatly.
Crude oil production in 1949 was only 0.88 million barrels.
Through effective and hard exploration for about twenty
years, some huge-scale oilfields, such as Daqing, Shengli,
Liaohe, had been discovered in 1960's and 1970's. This
resulted in the substantial increase of crude oil production.
In 1978 it exceeded 730 million barrels and became one
of the largest oil-producing nations in the world. From
1980 to the late 1990's, many middle-large oil fields
and gas fields have been discovered in the basins from
central to western China and in the offshore areas, such
as in Erdos, Sichuan, Tarim, Zunger and Bohai Sea and
Pearl River. Crude oil production grew steadily to 1,171
million barrels in 1997, ranking 5th in the world. Since
the late 1990's, oil production has grown slowly. In 2001,
the oil production increased to 1,204 million barrels.
In 1957, gas production was only 2.5 Bcf, and had reached
943 Bcf in 2000 ranking 14th place in the world. |
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All
these great achievements in exploration and development
of oil-gas resources have provided the dependable and
necessary energy for robust economic development since
1980's. It is these achievements that have driven "the
engine "of economic development. |
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China's
Growth of Oil Production
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China's
Growth of Gas Production
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Characteristics
of China's Oil and Gas Resources |
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In
China, almost all oil and gas resources occur in the sedimentary
basins. All the oil-bearing basins can be classified into
three types: terrestrial, marine and composite. About
86% of the oil and gas resources are distributed in terrestrial
basins, which usually have complex geological setting
unfavorable to oil exploration. Oil and gas resources
are not distributed homogeneously in all the sedimentary
strata. Oil mainly exists in the Eocene, Cretaceous and
Jurassic, and gas mainly in Tertiary, Carboniferous and
Ordovician. 70% of the oil and gas resources have burial
depth shallower than 3,500 m. |
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Geographically,
most petroleum deposits are widely distributed in four
regions: 1) East and North-East regions, including Songliao
and Bohaiwan basins, in which oil is richer than gas,
2) Central regions, including Sichuan and Erdos basins,
where gas is more abundant than oil, 3) Western regions,
including Tarim, Zunger, Chaidamu and Tuha basins, where
both of oil and gas are abundant, 4) Offshore regions,
including Bohai Sea, Huanghai Sea, East Sea, Northern
South China Sea. Obviously, oil mostly occurs in the East,
West and Bohai Sea, and gas occurs in the Central and
Western regions. |
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Topographically,
oil and gas deposits are distributed in a variety of topographic
settings, including hills, plains, seas, deserts, mountains,
swamps and loess landform. The statistical analysis shows
that about 53% of petroleum resources are in the hills
and plains of eastern regions of China, 47% in the complex
topographies of deserts and loess areas in the central
and western regions of China. |
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Geographical
Distributions of Oil and Gas Resources in China
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Evidently,
geographical and topographical settings of oil and gas
resources do not match with the demand of economic development.
In the southern regions with a relatively developed economy,
such as Shanghai, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Guangdong, petroleum
resources are rather poor, but in the central and western
regions with a laggard economy, such as Ningxia, Ganshu,
Qinghai, Xinjiang, petroleum resources are abundant. This
distribution of oil and gas resources is unfavorable to
the development of China's economy. So it is necessary
for China to allocate and adjust reasonably the distribution
of oil and gas resources through constructing infrastructure,
for example "West to East" gas pipeline, which
is under way. |
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China's
structure of petroleum resources is unbalanced. The ratio
of gas to oil is 0.45:1, lower than the world average
of 0.7:1.0. In the production of oil and gas, the ratio
is 0.16:1, very much lower than the world average of 0.7:1.
It is clear that China has a petroleum resources structure
of major oil and subsidiary gas. |
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Oil
and Gas Resources Topographical Distributions in China
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Generally,
the petroleum resources comprise both high and low quality
varieties. High-quality oil has lower density and is found
in the eastern and northeastern China, in burial depths
shallower than 3,000 meters, and is relatively easy to
exploit and produce. The low-quality oil includes heavy
oil and low permeable oil and gas resources. The high
quality oil and gas resources amount to about 57% of total
petroleum resources; more than 40% of which are proven
and more than 70% of the proven reserves have been recovered.
The lower quality oil and gas resources amount to about
43% of the total oil and gas resources (21% of heavy oil
and 22% of low permeable oil resources). They are difficult
to exploit and refine. |
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Besides
the above-mentioned conventional oil and gas resources,
China still holds abundant unconventional energy resources.
The unconventional oil resources include extra heavy oil,
bitumen, oil sand and oil shale. The unconventional gas
resources are coal-bed methane, water-soluble gas and
gas-hydrates. The total unconventional oil resources is
predicted at 73 billion barrels, coal-bed methane with
burial depth shallower than 2,000 m is about 1,060 Tcf,
and water-soluble gas about 1,590Tcf. There are evidence
of gas hydrates resource in the East Sea and South China
Sea. |
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