Page 5 - AsianOil Week 41 2022

AsianOil EAST ASIA AsianOil

China pursues oil and gas projects to

ensure winter supply

POLICY CHINA is pursuing a programme to push ahead The Tarim oilfield has during the first nine
with domestic oil and gas projects to ensure it months of this year produced 24.69mn tonnes
China will continue has sufficient energy supplies in the coming of hydrocarbons, an increase of 1mn tonnes
focusing on domestic oil winter, according to a report in China’s Eng- over the same period last year, according to the
and gas supply. lish language daily Global Times and other report.
regional media. As European countries and In northern China, State Power Investment
others scramble to secure oil and gas supplies Corporation’s Inner Mongolia branch is ship-
in the midst of international sanctions against ping 2mn tonnes of coal throughout the Inner
Russia, a major world energy supplier, China Mongolia Autonomous Region and the adjacent
is keen to avoid the chill of past winters, when Jilin and Liaoning provinces.
some regions were left in the cold. These efforts The report also pointed out that an expan-
include coal distribution, which China has tried sion of the LNG regasification terminal at Yang-
to cut back on in previous winters, but with shan Deep Water Port has been approved. Some
energy shortage consequences. $2.38bn will be invested to expand capacity by
Lin Boqiang, director of the China Centre for 6mn tonnes per year (tpy) by 2030.
Energy Economics Research at Xiamen Univer- The South China Morning Post reported last
sity, said China’s energy supply is generally bal- week that China is planning a major expansion
anced and stable and the winter energy supply is for receiving LNG. The report cites a draft plan
ensured, the Global Times reported. issued by the Ministry of Transport in 2019 that
The report noted several projects in China calls for the construction of 34 coastal LNG-re-
that are moving forward regarding production ceiving terminals and the addition of 224bn
and logistics, particularly ultra-deep drilling cubic metres of receiving capacity by 2035, more
in the Fuman and Tarim fields. Oil and gas than double China’s current capacity.
production has exceeded 10mn tonnes in the At the end of last year, China was operating
Fuman area, according to Global Times. Fuman 22 LNG terminals with a capacity of 92.27mn
is located within the Tarim Basin and covers a tonnes. In its 2021-25 five-year plan, expand-
17,000-sq km area, with oil and gas resources ing gas storage facilities such as LNG terminals
estimated at more than 1bn tonnes. Forty-five is a prime way to improve China’s flexibility for
wells, some reaching depths of 10,000 metres, ensuring energy supply.
have been drilled in the field during this year China is already the world’s largest importer
with a 95% success rate, making it the fastest of LNG, surpassing Japan last year. It considers
developed deep oilfield in China, the report said, natural gas a key transition fuel away from coal.
citing the China National Petroleum Corpora- The country plans to hit its carbon emissions
tion (CNPC). peak in 2030 and be carbon neutral by 2060. ™

Week 41 18•October•2022 www. NEWSBASE .com P5