TOKYO, May 29 (KUNA)

China`s top oil and gas producer PetroChina, is soon to announce the nation`s largest natural gas discovery, the state-run China Daily reported Tuesday.
"PetroChina is to announce a major natural gas discovery that`s even richer than our Puguang gas field in terms of reserves. The new gas field is also located in the southwest province of Sichuan," a source in Sinopec was quoted by the daily as saying. The new find, known as Longgang gas field, has two to three times the reserve of Puguang, making Longgang China`s top gas field, said Han Xuegong, a senior consultant with China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), PetroChina`s parent company.
The nation`s current top gas field, Sulige, in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, has proven reserves of 533.6 billion cubic meters. Puguang gas field in Sichuan Province boasts a proven exploitable reserve of 356 billion cubic meters, being the country`s second-largest, said the Ministry of Land and Resources earlier this year. With the increasing need for energy, China, the world`s second largest consumer of oil after the US, has strengthened exploration efforts to ensure energy safety, which experts say is vital to reduce the nation`s reliance on imports. China`s natural gas production is expected to reach 92 billion cubic meters by 2010, while demand will cross pass 100 billion cubic meters by then. Officials of Dazhou, Sichuan Province, announced during the weekend that a total of 3.8 trillion cubic meters of natural gas deposits have been found in the western part of the Sichuan Basin. The reserves at Dazhou include proven exploitable reserves of newly discovered 244 billion cubic meters -- China`s total production in around four years -- and the already-announced 356 billion cubic meters in Puguang gas field. Both PetroChina and Sinopec are tapping gas reserves in Dazhou.