The Deep Sea No 1 gas field is located 150 kilometers off the island of Hainan. (Photo/Xinhua)
The second phase of natural gas drilling by Deep Sea No. 1, the world’s first 100,000 tonne semi-submersible deepwater oil production and storage platform, has been completed.
For over a decade, China has been stepping up its search for oil and natural gas in the deep sea. Between 2012 and 2022, the number of deep-sea drilling platforms operated by the China National Offshore Oil Corporation increased from three to ten, including three ultra-deep-sea drilling platforms that can drill to depths of up to 3,000 meters.
In this second phase of drilling off the southern Chinese province of Hainan, 12 wells were dug with a total depth of 60,000 meters. Drilling this deep allows you to get closer to the earth’s crust to exploit the resources there. But the deeper you drill, the more difficult the difficulties are: the deeper you drill, the higher the pressure. According to previous reports, the pressure on the platform during the second phase of drilling was up to 69 million Pascals, 1,000 times the pressure in a pressure cooker.
Its success represents a huge technological breakthrough, coming just three years after the platform’s first phase was completed in June 2021. With the second phase of natural gas production about to begin, the gas field’s usable reserves will increase from 100 billion cubic meters to 150 billion cubic meters and annual natural gas production will increase from 3 billion to 4.5 billion cubic meters, increasing the share of natural gas in China’s energy mix.
