Key Player in Energy Structure Adjustment
The relatively clean nature of natural gas has indeed accelerated its penetration into various fields, such as daily life and corporate production and operations, with continuous growth in market demand across regions. The National Energy Administration has published articles stating that under the increasingly stringent constraints of resources and the environment, the green transformation of energy is increasingly urgent, necessitating a significant increase in the proportion of natural gas. In June this year, the National Development and Reform Commission and the National Energy Administration, among 13 ministries and commissions, jointly issued "Opinions on Accelerating the Utilization of Natural Gas," which clearly defines the gradual development of natural gas as one of the main clean energy sources in China's modern clean consumption energy system. According to statistics from the National Development and Reform Commission, from January to October this year, China's natural gas production reached 121.2 billion cubic meters, a year-on-year increase of 11.2%; the import volume of natural gas was 72.2 billion cubic meters, up 27.5%; and the consumption volume of natural gas was 186.5 billion cubic meters, up 18.7%.
High Peak introduces that with the continuous increase in China's natural gas consumption level, imported natural gas has become one of the major sources of China's natural gas supply. According to customs statistics, from January to October this year, China imported 54.165 million tons of natural gas, a year-on-year increase of 24.9%. Among them, gaseous natural gas was 25.073 million tons, up 5.9% year-on-year; liquefied natural gas reached 29.092 million tons, setting a new historical high, with a year-on-year increase of 47.7%.
The increase in natural gas consumption also reflects the adjustment of energy structures in various regions. Taking Beijing as an example, data from the Beijing Statistical Yearbook shows that between 2010 and 2016, Beijing's total energy consumption rose from 63.59 million tons of standard coal to 69.61 million tons of standard coal. The proportion of coal consumption dropped from 29.6% to 9.8%, a decrease of more than 60%. Meanwhile, the share of natural gas consumption increased from 14.6% to 31.7%, with an increase of around 50%.
China National Petroleum Corporation's Policy Research Office Deputy Director Wang Zhen also pointed out in an article that the current pricing system in our country does not have a separate price item for storage gas costs. Storage gas facilities are facing issues such as blocked investment return channels and a lack of market trading mechanisms. The cost compensation and benefit assessment mechanisms are both very unclear, which has seriously hindered the commercial operation and development of storage gas facilities.
Han Xiaoping frankly pointed out that the slow progress in the construction of gas storage facilities highlights the issue of insufficiently ideal implementation efficiency in the reform of the oil and gas system. After multiple broken promises, in May of this year, our country issued "Several Opinions on Deepening the Reform of the Oil and Gas System," which has become the most comprehensive and three-dimensional guiding document issued since the new round of oil and gas reform was proposed in 2014. However, experts also said that the essence of the oil and gas reform is to liberalize market access and pricing in the upstream, midstream, and downstream sectors of the oil and gas industry, dismantle various barriers that favor state-owned enterprises and regulate private capital, and allow more capital to enter the oil and gas industry. Currently, the oil and gas sector in our country is basically monopolized by state-owned enterprises, and it may still require a relatively long process for state-owned enterprises to share profits with private enterprises.
