Sinopec announces on Dec. 29 that its shale gas project in southwest Chongqing has an annual production capacity of 5 billion cubic meters. [Photo: Xinhua]

China's largest oil and gas producer has announced that its shale gas project in southwest Chongqing has an annual production capacity of 5 billion cubic meters.

This makes China the first country outside North America to realize commercial development of shale gas.

Sinopec is hoping a large-scale gas field with annual production of 10 billion cubic meters will be on stream by 2017.

Hu Degao is a senior officer with the company.

"Our system can pass through 90 percent of the quality shale beds. So none of the some 200 wells in the Shale Gas Field are empty and the output of each well is very high, with an average fluent flow of 300,000 cubic meters."

Shale gas is mainly methane. It is considered a clean energy resource.

The Fuling shale gas field, discovered in 2012, has a proven reserve of over 380 billion cubic meters.