China Petroleum's business performance has reached a historic high for three consecutive years, driven by technology to achieve counter trend growth

On March 30th, China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) released its annual performance announcement, showing that in 2024, CNPC achieved a revenue of 2.9 trillion yuan; The net profit attributable to the shareholders of the parent company was 164.68 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 2%. The company's operating performance has maintained growth, reaching a historic high for three consecutive years.

In recent years, the supply and demand situation in the energy market has been severe and complex. In 2024, oil prices will decrease by 2.5% year-on-year. In this situation, China Petroleum still achieved counter trend growth, further enhancing the efficiency of the two major oil and gas industry chains. This is due to the company's active response to various risks and challenges in recent years, continuous increase in exploration and development efforts, promotion of refining and upgrading, and green and low-carbon transformation, constantly accelerating the layout of emerging industries.

Search for new growth points

Coal rock gas and traditional coalbed methane are both produced in coal bearing strata, but they differ significantly in geological characteristics, occurrence mechanisms, and development methods. Coal rock gas is a new type of unconventional natural gas resource... "At the 43rd Cambridge Energy Week, a representative of China Petroleum proposed the theoretical understanding of coal rock gas geology and introduced the important progress of China Petroleum in promoting coal rock gas exploration and development.

This is one of the innovative achievements made by China Petroleum in the field of natural gas exploration and development. In recent years, with the continuous deepening of conventional natural gas exploration and development, China Petroleum has continuously improved its energy supply capacity and sought new growth points for natural gas reserves and production.

The company focuses on developing unconventional oil and gas, vigorously strengthens the development of unconventional natural gas such as shale gas and coal rock gas, and ensures stable supply in the domestic natural gas market. "The exploration and development of coal rock gas is of great significance. China is a large country of coal. As the main source rock of natural gas, coal rock is an inevitable trend for the development of the oil and gas industry, from conventional gas to tight gas in coal measures (an unconventional natural gas resource), and then to coal rock gas in the source." Zhang Shuichang, an academician of the CAS Member and a professor of the China Petroleum Exploration and Development Research Institute, said.

As the largest oil and gas field under China National Petroleum Corporation, Changqing Oilfield has strengthened technological innovation and provided strong support for the development of unconventional oil and gas resources.

The natural gas reservoirs responsible for exploration and development in Changqing Oilfield account for over 85% of tight gas, with a daily gas production of less than 10000 cubic meters per well, which is only one tenth or even one percent of the domestic medium and high-yield gas fields, making development difficult. Faced with challenges, Changqing Oilfield has gathered intelligence to tackle and innovate 30 main technologies, including 3D seismic, fast drilling, and volume fracturing, successfully solving the technical difficulties of tight gas development and achieving low-cost and high-efficiency development of tight gas.

Based on technological advantages, Changqing Oilfield continuously challenges the exploration and development of low-permeability oil and gas reservoirs, and strives to promote stable production of "ballast stones" and improve recovery efficiency projects. The company's annual natural gas production has exceeded 50 billion cubic meters for three consecutive years.

The stable growth of natural gas production has forged a new growth pole for China's oil reserves and production, and provided sufficient guarantee for domestic gas consumption. According to statistics, in 2024, China Petroleum sold 287.75 billion cubic meters of natural gas, a year-on-year increase of 5.2%; Among them, domestic sales of natural gas reached 227.83 billion cubic meters, a year-on-year increase of 3.7%.

Promote the transformation of refining and chemical industry

It is urgent for the petrochemical industry to supplement and strengthen its supply chain. We must accelerate transformation and upgrading, and transform the abundant oil and gas resources in Northeast China into a strategic advantage for comprehensive revitalization. "Wu Kai, Secretary of the Party Committee and Executive Director of PetroChina Dalian Petrochemical Company, deeply feels the urgency of the transformation of the petrochemical industry.

The surplus of low-end and shortage of high-end products have long been structural problems in China's petrochemical industry. Cracking the structural dilemma is an important issue facing China Petroleum.

China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) adheres to market demand orientation, promotes the transformation and upgrading of its refining and chemical business, vigorously develops new materials business, and accelerates its progress towards higher levels in the industry chain. The company is accelerating the adjustment of its stock structure, and the construction of integrated refining and chemical transformation and upgrading projects is in full swing. It is coordinating resource allocation and processing routes, actively promoting projects to reduce oil and increase chemical production, and reduce oil and increase special features.

At Daocheng Yading Airport located in Garze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province, refueling attendant Wang Xiaojun counted his work for the day and said, "We refueled 5000 liters of aviation kerosene for two flights today." The aviation kerosene products at the airport come from Sichuan Petrochemical, which is 400 kilometers away.

Sichuan Petrochemical, a subsidiary of China National Petroleum Corporation, has supplied over 95 million liters of aviation kerosene to five high-altitude airports in western Sichuan (airports with an altitude of 2438 meters or above) since its commissioning in 2014. It can support conventional regional passenger planes to fly around the Earth 950 times.

Compared to ordinary airports, high-altitude airports have more complex operating environments and higher requirements for fuel quality and supply assurance. Sichuan Petrochemical has the ability to provide aviation fuel support, and currently, we supply the products required for the five high-altitude airports in western Sichuan, "said Liu Hongyu, the head of the Planning and Operation Department of Sichuan Petrochemical.

In recent years, with the rapid development of the domestic civil aviation industry, the demand for aviation kerosene in the Sichuan Chongqing region has grown rapidly. As one of the main suppliers of aviation kerosene products in the Sichuan Chongqing region, Sichuan Petrochemical timely schedules production according to market demand, strengthens the connection between production plans and user needs, and fully expands aviation kerosene production capacity to ensure supply stability; Persist in revising and improving the regular production schedule list, and refine the demand plan. In 2024, Sichuan Petrochemical's monthly average production of aviation kerosene will reach over 130000 tons.

While accelerating the advancement of existing projects, PetroChina is also actively expanding blue ocean new material projects and technologies. The gas-phase polyolefin elastomer technology developed by the company has achieved significant breakthroughs, and the product indicators have reached a high level; The indicators of new products such as nitrile rubber NBR2306 for low-temperature resistant sealing materials have reached a high level. In 2024, the company's new material product output exceeded 2 million tons, achieving growth for three consecutive years.

At the 2025 work conference of the group company held earlier this year, Dai Houliang, Secretary of the Party Group and Chairman of China National Petroleum Corporation, clarified the transformation goal: "The refining and sales and new materials sub groups should actively adapt to market changes, strengthen the integration of supply, production, sales and trade, accelerate the construction of the 'refining and refined materials' industrial structure, and strive to improve competitiveness and efficiency

Persist in low-carbon development

Batch after batch of key new energy projects have started construction, the annual wind and solar power generation has more than doubled year-on-year, and the development and utilization capacity of new energy has increased by more than 50%... In 2024, China Petroleum's "dual carbon and three new" (new energy, new materials, and new businesses under the "dual carbon" goal) development has been reported frequently, and the new energy ecosystem of "wind, solar, thermal, electric, and hydrogen" integrated development has begun to take shape.

Against the backdrop of consensus on sustainable development and green transformation, how can China Petroleum implement the three-step deployment of "clean substitution, strategic substitution, and green transformation" to help achieve the "dual carbon" goal?

China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) is committed to promoting the integrated development of oil and gas business and new energy, building a multi energy complementary energy supply system, and promoting the development and utilization of wind and solar resources by its oil and gas field enterprises, continuously increasing the proportion of green electricity consumption. At the same time, the company continues to enhance its research and innovation capabilities in new energy technologies, energy conservation, pollution reduction, and emission reduction, and seeks breakthroughs in areas such as hydrogen energy, geothermal energy, and CCUS (carbon dioxide capture, utilization, and storage).

Put on the "hydrogen" equipment and go into battle. China Petroleum continues to strengthen the purification and utilization of by-product hydrogen from refining and the construction of hydrogen refueling stations. A large-scale renewable energy hydrogen production project of Company D has put into operation in Yumen Oilfield, producing hydrogen with a purity of over 99%; The "Hydrogen Replacement of Oil" green drilling demonstration project led by Changqing Oilfield marks a new breakthrough for the company in the field of hydrogen technology.

Carbon seeks the future. China Petroleum takes the lead in establishing the CCUS Innovation Consortium to continuously enhance its ability to create green value. Jilin Oilfield is building a CCUS industry cluster and independently developing a full industry chain CCUS engineering dedicated compressor unit for safe operation; The construction of a regional carbon sequestration service base in Liaohe Oilfield has established a CCUS supporting ground process system for the entire process of capture, liquefaction, injection, and recycling treatment.

The chirping of birds in the 10000 acre carbon neutral ecological park of Daqing Oilfield, and the gathering of sand gulls in the Alshan East Lake wetland of Huabei Oilfield... While promoting the green transformation of enterprise production, PetroChina actively carries out greening work and achieves good ecological effects. By the end of 2024, the green area of China's petroleum industry has reached 360 million square meters, with a total of 22000 acres of carbon sequestration forests, carbon neutral forests, and forests constructed.

Li Ruxin, Vice President of China National Petroleum Corporation, stated that in the next step, the company will continue to seize opportunities, take advantage of the trend, focus on high-tech, intelligent, and green technologies, continuously strengthen the research and development and production of high-tech new materials, continuously develop new quality productivity, and build a solid foundation for the company to promote high-quality development and accelerate the construction of a world enterprise. (Reporter Qi Hui)