Water Availability for Shale Gas Development in Sichuan Basin, China

• DOI: 10.1021/acs.est.5b04669
• Publication Date: 2016-02-16T21:34:14Z
• Authors: Mengjun Yu; Erika Weinthal; Dalia Patiño-Eche...; Marc A. Deshusses; Caineng Zou; Yunyan Ni; Avner Vengosh
• Keywords: Shale Gas; Sichuan basin; Tight gas

Unconventional shale gas development holds promise for reducing the predominant consumption of coal and increasing utilization natural in China. While China possesses some most abundant technically recoverable resources world, water availability could still be a limiting factor hydraulic fracturing operations, addition to geological, infrastructural, technological barriers. Here, we project baseline next 15 years Sichuan Basin, one promising basins Our projection shows that continued demand domestic sector Basin result high extremely stress certain areas. By simulating using information from current use (20 000–30 000 m3 per well), during decade reach 20–30 million m3/year, when well is projected active. this volume negligible relative overall ∼36 billion posit intensification might compete with other local water-stress areas Basin.