page_title: Petroleum industry in China
section_title: Oil drilling platforms
hierarchical_section_title: Petroleum industry in China / Domestic production / Oil drilling platforms
caption_attribution_description: 海洋石油981
context_page_description: The impact of the petroleum industry in China has been increasing globally as China is the fourth-greatest oil producer in the world.
  China imported a record 6.7m barrels a day of oil in 2015 and was forecast "to overtake the U.S. as the world’s biggest crude importer in 2016" According to the Energy Information Administration China first became the "world's largest net importer of petroleum and other liquids" by the end of 2013.
context_section_description: The largest oil field in the South China Sea, the Liuhua 11-1 field - located 210 km southeast of Hong Kong in the Pearl River Mouth Basin offshore south China, was discovered by Amoco (now BP) in January 1987 in typhoon alley. Water depth, the presence of heavy oil and a "very strong bottom-water drive" were among the technical challenges that had to be resolved before the oil could be extracted. Amoco and Nanhai East engineering teams experimented with offshore drilling techniques, floating production, storage and off-loading system (FPSO) that would have drilling and production support.  By 2008, the FPSO had equipment capable of handling 65,000 bbl of oil and 300,000 bbl of total fluids per day and it would be loaded and shipped by shuttle tankers.
  In 2010, oil blocks in Wushi oil field (off Zhanjiang, near Hainan) began to be auctioned to foreign companies, with CNOOC having the option to increase its stake to 51% whenever required.
  China's $1 billion oil drilling rig, the Haiyang Shiyou 981 - owned and operated by the China National Offshore Oil Corporation - in the South China Sea, Ocean Oil 981 - began its first drilling operations in 2012. It led to protests and hence had to be shifted back.
caption: Haiyang Shiyou 981 in contested waters
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