Guo Hongjin, Vice President of Sinopec Corp. and General Manager of the Oilfield Exploration and Development Division, stated that China’s domestic upstream sector will center its efforts around building a high-level exploration-production-supply-storage-sales system. It will accelerate the development of new quality productivity to advance new industrialization, remain committed to high-quality exploration and efficient development, continuously stabilize oil production and boost gas output, reduce costs and enhance efficiency, reinforce engineering and equipment support, deepen reform and innovation, and expedite safe, green, and low-carbon development. This aims to foster high-quality integration of traditional oil & gas, new energy, and low-carbon industries.

AI Commentary:
This article outlines Sinopec’s strategic layout and practical roadmap for its domestic upstream segment in ensuring national energy security and driving high-quality development. Notably, it aligns with China’s new energy security strategy and builds a full-chain development framework covering oil and gas exploration, equipment upgrades, innovation, reform, and low-carbon transformation. It reflects a visionary shift by a state-owned energy enterprise toward integrating traditional fossil energy with renewables and digital transformation.

Since the 14th Five-Year Plan, Sinopec's upstream sector has closely followed President Xi Jinping's energy security strategy and implemented the “Seven-Year Action Plan” and “14th Five-Year Development Plan” with high standards. This includes intensifying high-quality exploration and efficient development, safeguarding and expanding mineral rights, achieving major breakthroughs in oil and gas exploration, and setting record highs in reserves and production. Meanwhile, gas supply infrastructure, integration with renewables, engineering-equipment assurance, and systemized supply capability have been significantly improved. Technological innovation and digital transformation have made strides, with enhanced quality, cost reduction, and management reform advancing steadily. Green, low-carbon development has become a core principle, all contributing to national energy security and high-quality growth.

Key Strategies:

1. Major Breakthroughs in Exploration
Sinopec aims to explore deeper and more complex formations (deep/ultra-deep, tight oil/gas, unconventional resources, offshore), promoting risk exploration in strategic fields like deep carbonate reservoirs, shale oil/gas, and deep coalbed methane. Key basins include Tarim, Junggar, South Hubei, East China, and Sichuan, focusing on both conventional and unconventional reserves to secure future production bases.

2. Stabilizing Crude Production
In response to challenges from mature fields and low-quality remaining resources, Sinopec promotes scientific, refined, cost-effective, and cooperative development models to improve recovery and well productivity. For conventional oil, reservoir evaluation and recovery enhancement are priorities. For shale oil, strategies include integrated deployment, tiered evaluation, well group trials, and building the Shengli-Jiyang National Demonstration Zone.

3. Steady Growth in Natural Gas
Facing complex reservoirs and intense market competition, Sinopec will boost capacity, manage declines, and optimize infrastructure and market strategies. It will apply technologies for efficient production from tight and deep reservoirs, conduct pilot enhanced gas recovery, and expand differentiated value-based resource development. Integration of production, supply, storage, and marketing will be refined, with enhanced LNG import management and storage facility utilization.

4. Upgrading Engineering & Equipment Support
With upstream expansion into deeper, more complex targets and aging fields, Sinopec focuses on integrated management, market-driven operation, and equipment R&D. Enhancing standardization, smart modular equipment, simplified surface systems, and performance in water injection, heavy oil, gas recovery, and well services are emphasized to raise engineering efficiency.

5. Empowering Innovation & Digital Transformation
In response to production demands, Sinopec promotes in-depth integration of industry and innovation, advancing national R&D programs and original technologies. Focus areas include complex reservoir imaging, smart seismic acquisition, enhanced oil recovery, and CCUS. Digital tools will support intelligent field development, real-time operations, and low-cost deployment. “AI+” initiatives will reshape operational paradigms and research methodologies.

6. Deepening Reform & Management
To build new productivity and enhance core functions, Sinopec will streamline organizational structures, simplify procedures, and optimize resources. Standardized digital operations, market-driven mechanisms, human resource optimization, unified market service platforms, and risk management frameworks will be strengthened to increase value creation and improve operational resilience.

7. Demonstrating Safe, Green, Low-Carbon Leadership
As new energy systems emerge, Sinopec prioritizes safety and eco-management. It promotes digital safety tech, rigorous risk control, and rectification of environmental inspection issues. It also accelerates integration of oil & gas with renewable energy, optimizing wind-solar-geothermal layouts, low-cost clean energy replacement, and deployment of microgrids and “source-grid-load-storage” systems for quality and efficiency gains.