中文
China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) on August 16 announced the official operation of a thin coalbed methane (CBM) project, the first of this kind in the country, marking a major milestone for China in the unconventional natural gas development.
Initiated with its first well in 2005, the Panhe thin-seam CBM project has since witnessed the establishment of 212 wells, with individual wells producing up to 11,000 cubic meters per day and an average daily output exceeding 2,500 cubic meters.
Since the commencement of trial production in late 2020, the project has contributed a cumulative output of 180 million cubic meters of thin-seam CBM, representing half of the block's total output. This accomplishment signifies a successful transition from reserve estimation to actual production. The thin-seam CBM production could meet the natural gas consumption of 180 million households for one day.
Situated in Qinshui Basin of the Shanxi province, the project is China's inaugural large-scale commercially operated CBM initiative, undertaken by China United Coalbed Methane Corporation, a subsidiary of CNOOC.
CBM is unconventional natural gas stored in coalbeds in adsorbed form. Developing and utilizing CBM offers an effective solution to coal mining safety issues while providing an alternative clean energy source that contributes to environmental protection.
China's drive for CBM development has primarily focused on the primary coal seams within the Shanxi's Qinshui Basin and Inner Mongolia's Ordos Basin. In recent years, the production of gas from primary coal seams has seen a significant decrease, prompting intensified efforts towards thin-seam coalbed methane exploration.
Thin coal seams generally refer to seams with a thickness of less than 1.3 meters. CNOOC's provided data underscores that thin coalbeds constitute 20% of China's total recoverable CBM reserves, amounting to approximately 350 billion metric tons.
Relative to primary coal seams, thin coalbeds possess a distinctive layering structure, with varying gas contents and relatively lower resource abundance. This has historically labeled them as "marginal resources" in the coalbed methane industry.
Mihongang, Deputy Chief Engineer of CNOOC United Coalbed Methane Corporation, highlighted that the average thickness of coal seams in the Panhe block is merely 0.6 meters, only one-tenth of the thickness of primary coal seams. The coalbeds also exhibit complex characteristics such as multi-layer overlap, uneven single-layer distribution, and significant vertical span, making their extraction highly challenging.
As China's most CBM-abundant province, Shanxi contributes the lion's share of the nation's production.
According to data from China's National Energy Administration, the nation's estimated CBM stand at approximately 2.6 trillion cubic meters, with 803.9 billion cubic meters of proven geological reserves. Shanxi accounts for two-thirds of China's CBM reserves.
In 2022, China's CBM production reached 11.6 billion cubic meters, with Shanxi contributing over 80% of the nation's total.
In 2023, Shanxi has accelerated the development of its CBM resources, achieving a historic high of 5.24 billion cubic meters of extraction in the first half of the year.
(Writing by Alex Guo Editing by Emma Yang)
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