Aerial view of China National Offshore Petroleum Corporation’s drilling platform in Bohai Bay. (Photo/Xinhua)
China’s investment in mineral exploration has increased for the third consecutive year, according to a recent report released by the Ministry of Natural Resources.
The China Mineral Resources Report (2024) shows that the country’s investment in geological exploration, either oil and gas minerals or non-oil and gas minerals, has increased for the third consecutive year.
In 2023, a total of 124 new deposits were discovered. According to the report, by the end of last year, 173 types of minerals had been discovered in China, including 13 types of energy minerals, 59 types of metal minerals, 95 types of non-metallic minerals, and 6 types of water and gas minerals.
Significant progress has been achieved in oil and gas exploration in large oil and gas basins such as Tarim, Junggar and Bohai Bay in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Meanwhile, progress was also made in exploration for non-oil and gas minerals such as coal, copper, gold, lithium and phosphorus.
According to the report, China’s energy production reached a record high last year, while its consumption structure continues to be optimized.
The proportion of coal consumption in China’s total primary energy consumption has fallen from 67.4% to 55.3% over the past 10 years, while the proportion of clean energy has increased from 10.2% to 17.9%.
Laws and regulations related to mineral resources were further developed, with the second draft of the Mineral Resources Law being deliberated at the Standing Committee of the 14th National People’s Congress.
The report stressed that China has strengthened the supervision and management of geological exploration activities and strengthened safety production in geological exploration.
Actively promoting national science and technology projects, the key technologies and equipment of regional mineral exploration have made breakthroughs.
It added that 10 new national standards and 59 industry standards in the field of geology and minerals were newly published and implemented.
