China’s top shale gas field Fuling to pump record 7 bcm in 2020

China’s top shale gas field Fuling in the country’s southwest is expected to pump at a record 7 billion cubic metres (bcm) in 2020, as operator Sinopec Corp is set to add nearly 100 new production wells this year, according to a media report and a Sinopec official.

The Fuling field currently has a total of 402 wells in production, pumping 17.755 million cubic metres of gas a day, according to a report published on Thursday on the Wechat platform of state-run Chongqing Oil & Gas Exchange, citing local paper Chongqing Daily.

Forecast 2020 production at 7 bcm will represent an increase of about 16% over the field’s output in 2018, said a Sinopec official based in Fuling, in southwestern Chongqing city. The official also confirmed the number of new production wells planned for this year.

China’s shale gas output could reach 280 bcm, or 23% of the country’s total gas output, by 2035, according to a top researcher at PetroChina. China last year produced about 10.9 bcm shale gas, less than 7% of the nation’s total gas output.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Chen Aizhu; editing by David Evans)