China may make commercial exploitation of "combustible ice" in 2030
Source: www.mlr.gov.cn Citation: www.shangbao.net.cn Date: Dec.18, 2013
With the rapid development of economy, energy dispute has become the focus of the global political and economic problems. Exploration, development and use of new energy have got more and more attention of governments around the world. In the morning of Dec.17, the Ministry of Land and Resources held a news conference to introduce the China Marine gas hydrate exploration results. The officials of the Ministry of Land and Resources said that combustible ice was expected to replace oil and other traditional energy, and Commercial Exploitation of "combustible ice" would begin in 2030.
Natural gas hydrate, also called” combustible ice", is a kind of natural ice cage compounds and mainly distributed in ocean, a small amount of distribution in the land tundra. The appearance looks like snow, but can be lit. It is understood that 1 cubic meter of natural gas hydrates decomposition can produce 164-180 cubic meters of natural gas, which is a highly efficient clean energy and is known as the green energy in the 21st century.
As the replacement for energy, "combustible ice" in the global resources is very rich, and the amount of which has been proven two times of conventional fossil fuels such as coal, oil, natural gas carbon. Che ChangBo, Deputy director- general of the Geological Exploration Department of Ministry of Land and Resources, said that recognized around the world, the large amount of natural gas hydrate should have 1 quadrillion cubic gas into natural gas. We knew that the amount of conventional natural gas in the world was 430 trillion (cubic), shale gas 187 trillion (cubic), CBM 260 trillion (cubic), altogether they had not reached 1 quadrillion (cubic) gross.
According to the introduction, China has rich coal, less petroleum and weak gas. With economic development, energy security has becoming increasingly prominent. At present, China has become a net oil importer for 20 years. In 2012, the dependency of imported crude oil is as high as 56%, and China has become the world`s second largest oil importer and second largest oil consumer.
Then, as a kind of high efficient clean energy, how many reserves of "combustible ice" in China? The participating experts said that through 15 years of investigation and forecast, it was expected to have 68 billion tons of oil equivalents of "combustible ice" in the south sea of China; In Qinghai region, we had found 35 billion tons of standard oil of natural gas hydrate. Han Xiaoping, China energy network information officer, said that considering the Qinghai Tibet plateau still had not proven reserves of resources, the region`s "combustible ice reserves would be bigger.
The Ministry of Land and Resources said that from June to September of this year, we successfully drilled high purity "flammable ice” for the first time in Guangdong pearl river mouth basin in the east China sea, the equivalent of 1000-150 billion cubic meters of natural gas reserves. Che Changbo said “the natural gas in Beijing now is from the Ordos basin. The gas is about 5 trillion per 5 square kilometers, which equals 100 million per square kilometer. Now we see that about 20-30 billion per square kilometer square. Therefore, the abundance in this place is very high, which is equivalent to the level of upper gas siltstones in Sichuan. It makes a solid foundation for the early realization of natural gas hydrate development ”
Facing such a large reserves of natural gas hydrate, when it will be commercially developed has become the focus of the public attention. It is said that technical problems and extraction costs have become the bottleneck of the restricted countries exploitation of natural gas hydrate.
Although China has entered the advanced ranks of the gas hydrate investigation and study, we are still in the stage of key technology research and development in the aspect of mining. Zhang Haiqi, the director of the China Geological Survey Foundation, says that China is expected to realize the commercial development of the natural gas hydrate in 2030.
"According to the planning and research of the leadership team of Ministry of Land and Resources, our country could make breakthrough of gas hydrate development technology to adapt to the development scale, technology and equipment in the process of industrialization around 2020. The developed countries may be earlier. After about ten years, China is expected to realize the commercial development of the natural gas hydrate in 2030.
To achieve the commercial development of combustible ice will produce what kind of impact on the lives of ordinary people. Han Xiaoping, China’s energy chief information officer, believes that the significance lies in environmental improvement.
“Nowadays, the coal is cheaper. However, due to the smoke by burning, a lot of people may be sick which will spend large sums of money. Therefore, we had better spend more money on the using of clean energy than spend on the doctors in the future.（translated by TLRHVC）
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