On November 24th, the China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC Group) announced that their independently explored and developed 1500m ultra-deep-water gas field “Deep Ocean No.1” in the waters offshore from Hainan island’s Lingshui County had hit a daily output of 10 million cubic meters of natural gas. Reaching peak designed output ahead of schedule, the field has a 3 billion cubic meter annual production capacity.

This marks the comprehensive mastery by CNOOC of a complete technical system for production, operations and maintenance of ultra-deep-water offshore gas fields, and—in the form of offshore resources—provides new support for China’s economic hot spots such as Guangdong, Hong Kong and Hainan.

Explored in 2014, the "Deep Ocean No. 1" gas field has proven natural gas reserves of more than 100 billion cubic meters. This currently puts it among the world’s top ten oil and gas discoveries. With a maximum water depth in excess of 1,500m and a maximum well depth of more than 4,000m, it is China’s deepest offshore gas field as well as being the most difficult to explore and develop of any of the gas fields so far to have been independently discovered by China.

Of great significance in safeguarding national energy security, of optimizing the transformation of energy structures and of enhancing China's deep-sea resource development capabilities, its completion and commissioning marks the comprehensive entry of China's offshore oil exploration and development capabilities into the "ultra-deep-water era".

The development of Deep Ocean No. 1 was the first time for China to use many advanced deep water technologies and pieces of equipment. After commissioning on June 25, 2021, Deep Ocean No. 1 began the work of completing equipment commissioning and process optimization. Since then, with connections to Hong Kong, Gaolan, and Nanshan Terminals, the natural gas produced here has been connected to the national gas supply system.