Opportunities and challenges in deep coalbed methane development

FANG Zhiming; WANG Rundong; YANG Chenlong

doi:10.13247/j.cnki.jcumt.20240299

Abstract：The large-scale development and utilization of unconventional natural gas resources such as coalbed methane(CBM)is an important transitional measure for China's energy struc-ture to shift towards a high proportion of clean energy,and is an important guarantee for a-chieving China's"3060"dual carbon strategic goal.According to preliminary assessment,with 84.15％of CBM resources buried below 1 000 meters,China holds substantial deep CBM re-serves.Since the successful 2019 pilot development of the DJ3-7X2 well in the Daning-Jixian field,deep CBM extraction has gained significant attention.This paper reviews recent ad-vances in deep CBM development,both in China and internationally,and examines the associ-ated opportunities and challenges from the standpoints of policy,resource potential,and cur-rent technology.Our analysis indicates that China's accumulated technical expertise and practi-cal achievements over the years in CBM provides a solid foundation for deep CBM extraction.The development of deep CBM is in line with national and local energy policies and is strongly supported by enterprises.The abundant resources demonstrate enormous development poten-tial,presenting dual economic and strategic value.The rapidly developing demonstration pro-jects demonstrate the broad prospects of deep CBM development in China,providing opportu-nities for its development.However,unlike existing CBM development technologies,the lack of organic integration between deep CBM development theory,technology,and engineering practice under high temperature,high pressure,and high stress conditions,high market com-petition pressure,and environmental issues in the development process are the main challenges faced by deep CBM development.