Abstract
The Chinese government has introduced numerous policies and development plans to boost its shale gas industry in recent years. However, China’s shale gas exploration and development is still in the initial stage and has been confronted with many challenges. This paper systematically analyzes the current status of China’s shale gas industry from five aspects for the first time—resource situation, exploration and development status, policy and planning situation, technology status and international cooperation—then respectively elaborates on the different obstacles of shale gas development in the short run and the medium and long term. We argue that short-term barriers to the Chinese shale gas industry mainly include objective factors, such as geological and surface conditions, shale gas proven reserves, technology innovation and environmental concerns, while some man-made obstacles (except for water scarcity) may restrict shale gas development in the medium and long term. In order to better tackle the short-term challenges, this paper proposes policy recommendations from five perspectives: strengthening the investigation and evaluation of China’s shale gas resources; perfecting shale gas industry policy; establishing a national shale gas comprehensive experimental zone; enhancing scientific and technological research; and establishing a shale gas regulatory system with an emphasis on environmental protection and supervision.
Highlights
With economic development and population growth, world energy demand has grown rapidly since the 21st century
Some researchers suggest that technical problems are the primary obstacles hindering shale gas development in China [19,20], while others argue that man-made institutional barriers are the main restrictive factors [21,22]
When it comes to enterprise-to-enterprise cooperation, China’s shale gas development companies can acquire cutting-edge technologies by working with foreign oil companies to tap into resources abroad and jointing venture with international oil enterprises to explore China’s shale gas resources
Summary
With economic development and population growth, world energy demand has grown rapidly since the 21st century. The remaining category is directed toward studying the challenges and strategies of shale gas development in China, and this is the area where most researchers focus [4,16,17,18,19,20,21,22]. Zeng et al [19] find that various obstacles, such as resource exploration problems, policy problems, technical problems and insufficient pipeline infrastructure, will restrict China’s efforts to develop its shale gas industry. Some researchers suggest that technical problems are the primary obstacles hindering shale gas development in China [19,20], while others argue that man-made institutional barriers are the main restrictive factors [21,22]. Our findings merit particular attention from Chinese policymakers and researchers
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