Prospects of underground gas storage in China under the strategy of carbon neutrality

Abstract

For China to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060, the profound transformation from high-carbon to low-carbon and carbon-free energy sources is required for the energy supply and demand structure. In the future, the gas consumption will grow in large scale in China. It is estimated that the natural gas consumption in China will be about 6 000×108 m3 by 2030 and 6 500×108 m3 to 7 500×108 m3 by 2060. Due to the impact of the resource reserves, the capability to acquiring international resources, the safety of import channels and other factors on China's natural gas, it is necessary to build underground gas storages in large scale to ensure the growth of China's natural gas consumption. From the perspective of natural gas consumption safety, the underground gas storages with a gas storage capacity of 1 200×108 m3 to 1 300×108 m3 should be constructed, so as to meet the requirements for peak sheaving of natural gas in China and maintain the strategic reserves required. At present, the working gas capacity of China's underground gas storages is only about 150×108 m3, and it is necessary to further expand the field of storage construction to form the space layout of "1+3+N" gas storage base. In the process of China's energy transition, the related technologies of gas storage will be deeply integrated with the carbon storage, hydrogen storage, helium storage, compressed gas storage and other technologies in the future, for the purpose of maximizing the role of underground gas storages in energy field and facilitating to realize the strategic objective of carbon neutrality.

Keywords

• carbon neutrality
• underground gas storage
• energy transition
• gas-electric conversion
• hydrogen storage
• co2 sequestration