Chinese oil expert said Wednesday that by 2010 oil output from oil fields in China's offshore and western regions will replace those in eastern region as major oil supplier of the country.

By 2010, oil output of oil fields in offshore and western region will account for more than half of the total output of the country, said Yan Xuchao, director of the department of development and research of China National Petroleum Corporation ( CNPC), China's biggest oil producer.

Having been as China's traditional major oil supplier for nearly a half century, East China saw its output decline from 126. 44 million tons in 1990 to 110.71 million tons in 2003. The proportion of its total crude oil output in the country fell from 91.6 percent to 65.3 percent, said Yan.

However, during the same period, China's oil output in western region rose from 10.32 million tons in 1990 to 36.68 million tons in 2003. Its percentage in China's total output rose from 7.5 to 21.7. The oil output in offshore region rose from 1.26 million tons to 22.05 million tons and from 0.9 percent to 13 percent of China's total oil, he said.

According to Yan, Chinese surveyors expect to discover large oil or gas fields with recoverable reserves of more than 50 million tons in the western and offshore regions. The area contains a series of large-sized sedimentary basins but had never been fully explored.

In this sense, oil fields in western and offshore regions will sustain a stable growth of China's oil output in the next five to 15 years, said Yan.

Yan said that China's oil output will reach its pinnacle in the years 2010 to 2020.

With discoveries being made in new regions and further development of old regions, China is sure to maintain an annual crude oil output of 180 million tons by 2020. If some great oil- rich reserves were discovered, China's annual oil output could reach 200 million tons, he said.

Yan said China could maintain its peak annual oil output of 170 million to 180 million tons for over ten years after 2020 if large oil fields were discovered in China's deep sea area, the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and in the region of South China including 11 provinces and municipalities that boast an abundant oil and natural gas reserve, if substantial progress were made in joint exploration with foreign partners in the Nansha Islands and East China Sea, and if breakthrough were seen in development of unconventional resources such as oil shale and oil sand.

According to statistics of China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Association, mainly due to output growth in western and offshore regions, China saw the crude oil output rise to 44.731 million tons in the first quarter of 2005, 180 thousand barrels more per day over the same period of last year.

Source: Xinhua