China Completes Oilfield Project In Sudan - BBC Monitoring International Reports
Beijing, 24th July: A huge oilfield, a long oil pipeline and a large oil refinery China
built in Sudan have gone into operation, marking a major breakthrough in China's
expansion of its overseas oil markets.
The China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) beat out other international bidders
for the project, which was built by its subsidiary the China Petroleum Engineering
Construction Corp. (CPECC).
After more than a year of work, China finished the Muglad oilfield project, with an
annual production capacity of from 7 .5m tons to 10m tons. The project also
involved building a 1,506-km pipeline from Heglid in southern Sudan to the Port of
Sudan, and an oil refinery that processes at least 2.5m tons annually.
The huge oilfield lies in the Muglad Basin in midsouth Sudan, covering an area of
49,000 sq km with cumulative verified oil reserves topping 424 million cu m.
The oilfield, the first in Sudan, has a daily output of 150,000 bbl, or an annual
output of 10m tons.
China has made a series of technological breakthroughs in undertaking the huge
oil project, including in the sectors of oil engineering technology, geological
prospecting and oil drilling, said a company official, adding that crude oil is
expected to be sent to the Port of Sudan by the end of this month for export.
This was China's largest overseas oil project ever that meets international
standards, according to CPECC's president Qin Anmin.
The official said that China is actively exploring international oil markets, while
developing its own oil and gas resources with foreign partners.
China plans to develop 50m tons of oil and 50 billion cu m of natural gas from
abroad by 2010 by giving priority to developing oil markets in the Middle East,
Africa, Russia, South America and Central Asia.
China is moving ahead in oil exploration and development overseas. CNPC and
its subsidiary CPECC have so far completed a number of oil projects in Peru,
Canada, Thailand, Kuwait, Kazakstan and Sudan, and have produced a certain
amount of crude oil overseas.
According to Qin, CPECC has signed overseas oil construction contracts worth
more than 1bn US dollars. It has also been listed among the world's top 225 oil
industry contractors for five consecutive years.
Source: Xinhua news agency, Beijing, in English 1315 gmt 24 Jul 99 |
