Development of natural gas industry in China: Review and prospect

In order to better promote the sustainable, effective and rapid development of natural gas business and the on-schedule realization of “carbon peak and carbon neutrality” goal, this paper summarizes and reviews the achievements and experience in the development of natural gas industry in China. Then, the influence of energy environmental policies on the development of natural gas industry is analyzed, and domestic natural gas exploration and development situations are dissected. Finally, domestic natural gas exploration and development prospect is forecasted, and the corresponding development suggestions are proposed. And the following research results are obtained. First, under the commitment of the Paris Agreement and the strategy of carbon peak and carbon neutrality, China's natural gas industry faces unprecedented development opportunities. Second, domestic natural gas is characterized by abundant resource bases, low proven rate of resource and clear target and field of reserve and production increase, but the complexity of the resources and the rise of exploration and development cost make it more difficult to realize the large-scale efficient increase of natural gas production. Third, nevertheless, in order to ensure national energy security and reach the dual goals of economic development and environmental protection, China continues to powerfully enhance domestic oil and gas exploration and development. According to the growth trend of new proved gas reserves, it is predicted that the domestic new proved gas reserves by 2040 will be 16 × 1012–20 × 1012 m3, the peak natural gas production of 2900 × 108–3300 × 108 m3 will be reached in 2030, and the proven rate of recoverable gas resources will be around 14%, which indicates the sustainability of the development goal. In order to realize these development goals, five suggestions are put forward: (1) Maintain continuous and stable investment in exploration and development, so that new breakthroughs and discoveries can be achieved continuously in natural gas exploration and natural gas development can keep the production arrow upward while compensating the production decline; (2) Strengthen technological researches and make use of technological and managerial innovation to break through forbidden exploration areas and improve the development benefits of gas fields; (3) Enhance the comprehensive management of developed gas fields to increase their ultimate recovery factor; (4) Optimize domestic and foreign gas sources, conventional and unconventional gas compositions as a whole to improve the ability to deal with gas supply risks; (5) Provide taxation preferences and subsidy policies continuously for unconventional natural gas to speed up the large-scale benefit production increase of unconventional natural gas.