Progress and prospects of shale gas exploration and development in China

A global astounding gas green revolution is booming.More than 20 countries except for the North America are conducting prophase evaluation and pilot test of shale gas exploration and development.Shale gas resource has already become a natural gas production target with great potential and of great significance.There are three types of organic-rich shale developed in China,including marine,marine-continental transitional facies-continental coal series and lacustrine facies.These types of shale all have shale gas formation and enrichment conditions,so the shale gas resource is abundant.China has made important progress in the potential evaluation and pilot test of exploration and development of shale gas resources and is seeking for a means to effectively develop shale gas resources.This paper systematically summarizes China's shale gas exploration and development practice and analyzes shale gas resource prospect.On this basis,it points out the development prospect is promising thanks to that the shale gas resources are not only rich,but have been practically found in many places in China.Compared with the North America,formation and development of China's shale gas have obvious particularity and many geological and development problems need to be solved urgently.With innovation of shale gas geological evaluation and development theory and relevant key technology breakthroughs,improvement of economic conditions and national policy support,prospects for development of shale gas resources in the future are broad and expected to change the pattern of China's natural gas development and even the whole energy development.