China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC) has announced its first deepwater gas field discovery in the South China Sea, Xinhua reports. The discovery was made by CNOOC drilling rig HYSY 981, the same drilling platform that sparked a diplomatic spat when it was parked within waters claimed by Vietnam as part of its exclusive economic zone (EEZ).
According to Xinhua, the newly discovered gas field, dubbed Lingshui 17-2, is located 150 kilometers south of Hainan — in other words, not in a disputed area of the South China Sea. The gas field, located at an average depth of 1,500 meters, is classified as an “ultra-deepwater gas field.”
CNOOC representatives told CCTV that China “is now technologically capable of drilling in any place in the entire South China Sea.”Xie noted that this represented the highest gas flow of all the the gas wells tested by CNOOC so far. Presumably, one of those tested wells would be the one CNOOC was working on near the disputed Paracels Islands earlier this summer. In that sense, the announcement regarding Lingshui 17-2 is good news for China-Vietnam relations, as it seems CNOOC did not find the controversial drill site to be as promising as the gas field near Hainan.
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