China Petrochemical Corp., China’s second- biggest oil and gas producer, plans to double annual shale gas production capacity at its Fuling project in southwest China in the next two years to 10 Bcm.
The Beijing-based company known as Sinopec Group has steadily produced 15 MMcmgd of shale at the site for more than a month, it said in an e-mailed statement on Tuesday. Current gas production could meet daily gas demand of 30 million families, it said.
“The Fuling shale gas development model could be easily applied to similar projects in China, and support the country’s large-scale exploration of the fuel,†deputy general manager Jiao Fangzheng said in the statement.
The combined shale gas output from Sinopec Group and PetroChina Co., the country’s biggest oil and gas producer, may reach 5.1 Bcm this year, lagging China’s output target of 6.5 Bcm, Bloomberg reported Dec. 9, citing people with direct knowledge of the matter.
Proved shale gas reserves at Fuling more than tripled to 380.6 Bcm making it the world’s second-largest shale gas field outside North America, China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., or Sinopec said Oct. 15. The project sits in mountainous rural Chongqing and has produced 3.9 Bcm of the fuel since starting production, according to the Tuesday statement.
China’s total proven shale gas reserves are estimated at 500 Bcm, according to the Chinese Academy of Engineering.