BEIJING: China has discovered its first deep-water, deep-reservoir oil find in the South China Sea, state-owned oil giant CNOOC announced on Friday.
The Kaipingnan oilfield, 300km southwest of the waters of Shenzhen in South China, has a proven reserve of 102 million tons of oil equivalent, the company said. It is the first oil reserve with a water depth of more than 300 meters and a well depth of over three thousand meters found by China’s own efforts, as well as the largest, according to CNOOC. The maximum depth where the oilfield is located is 532 meters and the maximum well depth reached 4,831 meters.
Testing drilling yields over one thousand tons of oil and gas on a daily basis, which is a new record in China for a deep-water, deep-reservoir oilfield, the company added.
The Kaipingnan oilfield demonstrated the vast potential of deep-water exploration in the Sea, and further consolidated the foundation of Beijing’s offshore oil and gas reserve, which is significant toward ensuring the nation’s energy security, the company said in a press note on Friday.
Recent discoveries by China
In recent years, CNOOC made major discoveries at the Bozhong 26-6 deep-reservoir oilfield in China’s Bohai Sea and the Baodao 21-1 gas field in western South China Sea.
CEO of CNOOC Zhou Xinhuai said the company’s continuous discoveries in the eastern part of the Sea forged new growth drivers for its offshore oil and gas business, noting the firm will continue to pour more efforts in oil and gas exploration in the South China Sea to ramp up energy supply capacity.
