PetroChina’s drilling of exploration well Penglai-1 has produced 1,219,800 cubic meters (mcm) of natural gas during production testing, according to a press release.

This discovery confirms the abundance of natural gas in the Central Sichuan Basin.

 With an authorized exploration area of 2,000 square kilometers, the new zone is estimated to harbor potential resources of over one trillion cubic meters (tcm).

In September 2019, PetroChina discovered shale gas geological reserves at the Changning-Weiyuan and Taiyang blocks in the Sichuan basin totalled 740.97 billion cubic metres (bcm). China has been raising spending on domestic oil and gas drilling to a multi-year high in response to Beijing’s call to boost energy supply security.