On January 8, 2019, the 2018 State Science and Technology Award Conference was held in Beijing in recognition of the remarkable contributions of distinguished scientists, engineers and researchers. "Deep-sea gas hydrate three-dimensional comprehensive experimental exploitation system development and application" led by Prof. Li Xiao-Sen of Guangzhou Institute of Energy Conversion, CAS clinched a second prize of State Technological Invention Award.

Natural gas hydrate resources are huge in China. In situ gas hydrate production test is risky and costly. Scale test technology for field mining is the only way for large-scale development.

Overcoming all the harsh geological conditions of deep-sea natural gas hydrate, this project investigates the bottleneck problems in the research and development of equipment such as formation construction, drilling, well pattern deployment and drainage. The project develops the world's first three-dimensional large-scale equipment applied for the investigation of gas hydrate exploitation technology, which enables solving key problems such as difficult gas hydrate exploitation and control. The system has been used to establish the optimal exploitation technology and complete the evaluation of the exploitation potential of natural gas hydrate reservoirs. It provided technical support for the successful field test of gas production from natural gas hydrate in South China Sea, and it would serve as a safeguard for China’s strategic deployment and commercial exploitation platform establishment of natural gas hydrate.