Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region will top the
country's energy grid, boasting robust reserves.
"(The) oil production and petrochemical sectors have become
Xinjiang's pillar industries, with output from them accounting for
more than 60 percent of the region's total industrial output,"
chairman of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region Ismail Tiliwaldi
said on Friday at the fifth session of 10th National People's
Congress.
According to Tiliwaldi, estimates for 2006 place crude oil
production at 24.8 million tons and natural gas production at 16.1
billion cubic meters.
Over the next three years, China's top two energy giants CNPC
and Sinopec will spare no efforts to double output from Xinjiang to
44 million tons of oil equivalent, sources from the National
Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said. The plan will enable
Xinjiang to match Heilongjiang Province as China's top
oil-production powerhouse.
"The target is feasible, based on the robust reserves in
Xinjiang and the huge investment injected into it," Zhang Zhiguo, a
press official with Beijing-based Sinopec, said. CNPC and Sinopec
poured a total of 68.6 billion yuan into Xinjiang for oil and gas
exploration and production from 2005 to 2006, the NDRC said.
China's top oil producer CNPC said the firm will make greater
efforts to develop potential fields in Northwest China. "The bulk
of our planned investment, however, will go to the oilfields in
western China especially Xinjiang," Han Xuegong, a veteran
consultant for CNPC, said.
(China Daily March 10, 2007)