PetroChina's Dagang Oilfield is significantly boosting its production program with plans to extract more than 6 million tons of oil equivalent per year by 2010.

"We plan to gear up exploration and production (E&P) efforts to supply much-needed oil and gas resources and to fuel the development of Tianjin Binhai New Area and the north part of China at large," He Shushan, president of PetroChina's Dagang Oilfield, said.

"By 2010, we plan to roll out 6 million tons of oil equivalent, making this area into a big oilfield."

Located in Tianjin Municipality, the oilfield has added 214 million extra tons of oil reserve in place this year, as part of its ambitious goal to hike 1 billion tons of oil equivalent reserve in three to five years, a senior executive of PetroChina told China Daily on the sidelines of China's parliament meeting.

As a fast-growing economy, China is relying on new domestic oil discoveries to boost output and to fuel its robust energy demand.

Last year, the company produced 215 million tons of oil equivalent, He said.

Last year, Dagang Oilfield's output was 5.5 million tons of oil equivalent, which made it PetroChina's eighth largest oilfield.

PetroChina discovered 214 million tons of oil equivalent at Dagang oilfield in 2007, in terms of reserve in place.

He added that the new discovery at Jidong Nanpu Oilfield strengthened Dagang's determination to gather more reserves. The resource volume of the field now has larger potential than previously estimated.

"The resource volume of Dagang is believed to hit 2.3 billion tons of oil equivalent, with only half of it being proven already. That demonstrates the huge potential of Dagang Oilfield," He stressed.

The Jidong Nanpu Oildfield was also a small field several years ago. Technology innovation was the driving force behind the new discovery at Nanpu, according to He.

PetroChina made new discoveries at Jidong Nanpu Oildfield last year, with more than 1 billion tons of oil equivalent reserves in place.

It is a major challenge for an old oilfield to come up with new reserves, as oil and gas resources are depleting on a year-on-year basis.

Jilin Oilfield, another arm of PetroChina, aims to boost crude output by an annual rate of 6 percent till 2010.

Hou Qijun, president of Jilin Oilfield, was quoted by Reuters saying that his company has set an output target of 8 million tons of oil equivalent, which includes natural gas, for 2010, versus around 6.55 million tons of oil equivalent last year.

(China Daily March 10, 2008)