Energy cooperation between China, U.S. benefits both sides: Chinese executive

HOUSTON, March 11 (Xinhua) -- The Oil and gas industry in CHINA and the United States are complimentary, a senior executive of a leading Chinese energy company said here on Monday.

Hou Qijun, vice president of CHINA National Petroleum Cooperation made the remarks during the Special Dialogue on CHINA at the CERAWeek that kicked off on Monday in Houston in the U.S. state of Texas.

According to Hou, the U.S. energy industry has been going through revolutionary changes in the past decade, with increasing productions of both crude Oil and natural gas.

On the other hand, CHINA has become the world's largest Oil importer in 2017 and also one of the largest natural gas importers in 2018. "Naturally, a large energy producing country and a large energy consuming country are complimentary," he said.

Hou noted that CHINA's increasing imports of U.S. energy can improve the trade structure of the two countries, reducing trade deficit and diversify the energy import source of CHINA.

In its latest outlook released on Monday during the CERAWeek, International Energy Agency (IEA) reported the United States led the growth in global Oil production and forecast the country will provide as much as 70 percent of the increase in global Oil supply in the next five years and will provide 75 percent of the increase in global natural gas supply by 2024.

Meanwhile, according to the Chinese National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), CHINA's imports of crude Oil and natural gas jumped in 2018. Crude Oil imports surged 10.1 percent year on year to 460 million tonnes, a record high, while, natural gas imports came in at 90.39 million tonnes, rising 31.9 percent year on year.

The 38th CERAWeek, which kicked off with the IEA press conference, is an annual energy meeting held by the London-based information company IHS Markit with the attendance of prominent speakers from energy, technology and financial sectors. This year's meeting was attended by more than 4,500 guests from over 70 countries and regions.

There is a special dialogue on CHINA as well as several discussions designed to focus on Asian and Chinese energy market since CHINA has become one of the largest energy consumption economies in the world.