ASIA: Bohai Bay Discovery of PetroChina, may Be Larger Than Announced

PetroChina Co., the nation's biggest oil producer, said reserves at the newly discovered Jidong Nanpu field in Bohai Bay may be larger than initial announcements indicate.

PetroChina plans to produce 10 million metric tons of oil (200,000 barrels a day) from the field by 2012, President Jiang Jiemin said at the company's annual general meeting in Beijing today. PetroChina said May 3 it discovered the field in northeastern China's Bohai Bay that holds about 7.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent.

PetroChina has spent 5.7 billion yuan ($740 million) on Jidong Nanpu so far, Jiang said. The discovery cost equates to 59 cents a barrel.

The Jidong Nanpu field has ``geological reserves'' of 1.02 billion tons of oil equivalent, including ``proved reserves of original oil in place'' of 405 million tons, ``probable'' reserves of 298 million tons, PetroChina said May 3, using industry measures.

``Possible'' reserves are 202 million tons and ``proved reserves of original natural gas in place'' are equal in energy content to 112 million tons of oil, the company said. Annual production at the field may peak at 25 million tons, the China Securities Journal reported May 8.

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