Huang Jiqing (1904-1995)
Huang Jiqing was a pioneering figure in modern Chinese geology and one of the founders of China's modern geological endeavors. He became a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. In 1924, he enrolled in the Department of Geology at Peking University and earned his Ph.D. in Science from the University of Neuchâtel in Switzerland in 1935.
His contributions to geology are substantial. He authored "Permian Stratigraphy of Southern China," proposing a tripartite scheme for China's Permian period, laying the groundwork for the stratigraphy of China's Permian period. He wrote the "Geological Survey Report of Xinjiang Oilfield," advancing the theories of continental oil formation and multi-stage oil storage. His publication "Major Geological Structural Units of China" established the theory of multicycle tectonic movements, laying the foundation for Chinese tectonics. He also served as the chief editor for 14 sheets of 1:1,000,000 international geological maps of eastern China and a 1:3,000,000 geological map of China, playing a crucial role in national mineral surveys.
In the 1950s, he directed and deployed the national oil survey, making significant contributions to the discovery of the Daqing Oilfield. He was awarded the National Natural Science Award of China (First and Second Class), and in 1994, he received the Ho Leung Ho Lee Foundation Science and Technology Achievement Award. In 1955, he was elected as a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
In August 1986, Huang Jiqing (seated leftmost) participated in a discussion with researchers in Daqing.
In 1955, Huang Jiqing (center) led students from the Beijing Institute of Geology on a field trip to the Western Hills of Beijing.
In January 1943, Huang Jiqing (third from the right) and others conducted petroleum geological surveys in the Dushanzi Oil Field in Xinjiang.
Huang Jiqing presents a geological structure map.
Manuscript: Direction to Find Oil in the Songliao Plain
In 1914, the American Standard Oil Company conducted petroleum geological exploration in northern Shaanxi. Seven wells were drilled in Yanlong, Fushi (now Yan'an), Ansai, Zhongwen (now Huangling), and Yijun Temple, at a cost of 2.5 million US dollars, yielding no results. Subsequently, Professor Whitehead of Stanford University visited China for a short-term survey and, upon returning, published an article stating that China lacked Mesozoic or Cenozoic marine sedimentation, meaning there were no oil fields worth exploiting. He concluded that China would never produce a significant amount of oil. This led to the spread of the "China Poor in Oil" narrative worldwide.
However, a group of persistent geologists held onto hope for Chinese oil, believing that Standard Oil's failure did not prove the absence of oil in China, and the assertion of "China Poor in Oil" was premature. They ventured into the mountains and forests, conducting years of field surveys and theoretical analyses, eventually discovering large oil and gas fields in the Songliao Basin, Bohai Bay Basin, and other areas, dispelling the notion of "China Poor in Oil."
One of these geologists was Huang Jiqing, a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. In the 1930s, he began researching petroleum geology, and from the 1950s onwards, he played a significant role in planning, deploying, and guiding nationwide petroleum surveys, contributing greatly to the discovery of large oil fields like Daqing.
Seeking Knowledge Abroad
Since his youth, Huang Jiqing had been interested in petroleum geology. After graduating from the Department of Geology at Peking University in 1928, he joined the Geological Survey as a surveyor. In the summer of 1932, with funding from the Sino-Educational and Cultural Foundation, he went to study in Switzerland and obtained a PhD in Science in 1935. During his time in Switzerland, he used his frugally saved scholarship to spend about three months in the United States on academic visits and geological travels, focusing on petroleum geology.
With the assistance of American geologist Schuchert and the director of the United States Geological Survey, Mendenhall, he visited major American oil companies, attended meetings of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, inspected several oil fields, and exchanged ideas with the heads and chief geologists of oil production bases, particularly observing oil seeps and asphalts before field development. Before leaving the United States, Huang also visited two famous petroleum geologists, Lord Buckland and Whitehead, for academic discussions.
In June 1937, Huang Jiqing represented the Geological Survey and the Geological Society of China at the 17th International Geological Congress held in Moscow. Through studying Carboniferous and Permian strata, Huang initially recognized the tectonic outlines of the Russian platform and the oil-bearing potential of the Urals, providing valuable experience for future petroleum exploration in China.
After the congress, Huang Jiqing set off for home. On August 3, when he arrived in Vladivostok to prepare to board a ship back to Shanghai, he was shocked to learn about the Marco Polo Bridge Incident. With deep sorrow and indignation, he had to return to Moscow and then undergo numerous hardships before finally returning to his homeland in October. By then, the full-scale war against Japan had erupted, and Huang Jiqing immediately took charge of relocating the Geological Survey. Within a year, the Geological Survey moved several times, finally settling in Beibei, Chongqing, amidst unimaginable hardships.
In August 1948, Huang Jiqing was invited by the British Council to visit the United Kingdom and attend the 18th International Geological Congress held in London. During his visit, he participated in meetings of the structural geology and petroleum geology groups, met with geologists from British and Iranian Petroleum Companies, and discussed the geological structures, development, and production of oil fields in the Middle East. Subsequently, Huang Jiqing conducted over two months of geological surveys in the UK, specifically visiting petroleum geologist and Chief Geologist of the Nottingham Oilfield, Strong, who provided detailed explanations of the geological structures, development processes, and production situations of British oil fields, greatly enriching Huang's knowledge.
In early 1949, Huang Jiqing sailed from the UK to the United States, beginning his second visit to America. This trip was once again focused on petroleum geology. He revisited the United States Geological Survey, held discussions with experts there, paid special attention to the petroleum geology and industrial development of the United States, and visited several important oil companies and oil fields at the time, learning about the latest oil exploration methods.
Two Theories Provide New Insights into Finding Oil
Since the 1920s, Chinese geologists had conducted multiple surveys and believed that China had oil fields worth exploiting. In 1921, geologists Weng Wen-hao and Xie Jia-rong conducted a petroleum geological survey in Yumen, Gansu, and in 1922 published a paper indicating the exploitable value of petroleum in Yumen. In 1923, geologist Wang Zhuquan surveyed petroleum geology in northern Shaanxi, and in 1932, together with geologist Pan Zhongxiang, revisited northern Shaanxi to investigate the underground oil layers in Fushi and Yanlong. These surveys all proved that continental sedimentation could yield oil. In 1928, geologist Li Siguang also pointed out in his paper "The Problem of Fuel" that "the failure of Standard Oil does not prove that China has no exploitable oil fields."
Before 1938, Huang Jiqing's surveys of oil fields in the United States and the Soviet Union showed that petroleum and natural gas came from marine sedimentary rock series. The petroleum geology literature he read emphasized marine formations, particularly the importance of shallow marine sedimentation. At that time, no oil fields formed by continental formations had been discovered worldwide. However, from 1941 to 1943, field surveys in western China completely changed Huang Jiqing's understanding. A large amount of field survey data made him realize that continental formations could also form significant oil-bearing layers.
From the autumn of 1941 to the spring of 1942, Huang Jiqing led a team to conduct geological surveys with petroleum as the focus in Gansu and Qinghai in northwest China. Their work focused on the Jiuquan Basin. While investigating the reservoir layers of the Laojun Temple structure, they found that the oil-bearing layers belonged to the Lower Tertiary sandstone, but the oil-bearing layers were older, generally appearing in the Jurassic and Cretaceous, sometimes in the Permian and Triassic. Large amounts of crude oil also existed in the Jurassic sandstone of the eastern section of Longshoushan, such as Qingtu Jing. These formations were all continental sedimentary layers. Based on these survey facts, Huang Jiqing essentially recognized that continental sedimentation could also yield oil-bearing layers and form economically valuable oil fields. After the conclusion of the Northwest geological survey, from autumn 1942 to summer 1943, Huang Jiqing, along with scholars such as Yang Zhongjian, Cheng Yuqi, Zhou Zongjun, Bian Meinian, and Weng Wenbo, conducted geological surveys in Xinjiang, while also studying the glacial geology of the southern foothills of the Tianshan Mountains.
Based in the Dushanzi oilfield, they conducted detailed studies on the geological structure of the oilfield and became familiar with drilling, extraction, and refining engineering. The team surveyed the surrounding geological and geomorphological features of the oilfield and made several excursions into the northern foothills of the Tianshan Mountains, gaining preliminary knowledge of the geological formations, producing a topographic-geological map of the Dushanzi oilfield, and delineating the "mining area" boundaries for oilfield development. After a 52-day stay in Dushanzi, the survey team headed south into southern Xinjiang to continue their investigation of petroleum geology.
In October 1943, Huang Jiqing completed the "Xinjiang Oilfield Geological Survey Report." It was in this report that he proposed two theories of petroleum geology: the Continental Genesis Oil Theory and the Multi-Period, Multi-Layer Oil Accumulation Theory, elucidating that continental strata could form economically valuable oilfields.
The report emphasized that the oil-bearing strata in the Junggar Basin may include the Upper Permian Watermole Formation, the Jurassic Black Shale Formation, the Triassic Dark Layers, the Cretaceous Smoking Mountain Formation, and the Lower Tertiary Dushanzi Formation. In other words, the oil-bearing strata in the Junggar Basin are multi-period. The Triassic, Jurassic, Cretaceous, and Tertiary formations are all continental strata, belonging to continental basin sedimentation.
Through the study of oil-bearing rock series in the Junggar Basin, Huang Jiqing and other scholars reached the preliminary conclusion that the oil-bearing strata in large basins are multi-period, and their sedimentary nature is often continental (although it can also include marine facies). Observations in the Tarim Basin showed that the Jurassic, Cretaceous, and Tertiary formations are continental strata, and they may also bear oil.
Subsequently, the exploration and development of many important oil and gas fields in China and abroad confirmed the correctness of the two theories proposed in the "Xinjiang Oilfield Geological Survey Report."
In the summer of 1946, Huang Jiqing went to Beijing to oversee the publication of the "Journal of the Geological Society of China" and "Mr. Ding Wenjiang's Geological Survey Report," while also serving as a professor in the Department of Geology at Peking University. During this time, he had the opportunity to collect and read various geological and mineral reports written by Japanese geological workers. Among them, the research on petroleum geology and petroleum exploration, especially the oil prospecting reports in the Northeastern Provinces and the petroleum exploration reports in the Fuxin Coalfield, caught Huang Jiqing's attention, prompting him to further consider the possibility of finding oil and natural gas in North China and Northeast China.
If the continental basins in western China can form economically valuable oilfields, then the continental basins in eastern China, such as the North China Basin and the Songliao Basin, can also form similar oilfields. Huang Jiqing's "bold" idea undoubtedly broke through the theoretical constraints of the "China Poor Oil Theory" and laid the theoretical foundation for placing large-scale continental sedimentary basins in the direction of petroleum exploration in the first round of China's petroleum survey.
The Flourishing of Petroleum Survey
Petroleum is closely related to economic development and national defense construction. New China urgently needed to develop the petroleum industry. In May 1954, the Ministry of Geology established the Mineral Survey Committee (hereinafter referred to as the Survey Committee), with Li Siguang as the chairman and Huang Jiqing and Xie Jiarong as executive committee members, responsible for technical leadership. The original task of the Survey Committee was to guide various national mineral surveys and explorations. In December, the Ministry of Geology designated petroleum survey as a key task, and the Survey Committee became the competent authority for petroleum survey. Starting from 1955, the focus of the Survey Committee's work shifted to national petroleum and natural gas surveys and explorations, no longer undertaking other mineral surveys.
From the end of 1954 to the beginning of 1955, in preparation for the first petroleum survey conference, Huang Jiqing organized technical personnel from the Survey Committee and the Fuel Department of the Geological Bureau to collect and discuss analytical data. He believed that oil exploration work should be conducted nationwide, deploying survey teams in Sichuan Province, the Ordos region, North China, as well as the Songliao, Junggar, Turpan, Tarim, and Qaidam basins.
Based on the theory that continental strata are suitable for oil generation and storage, and through in-depth studies of China's geological structure, Huang Jiqing emphasized that large-scale basins of the Mesozoic and Cenozoic should be the main targets for oil exploration.
From January 20th to February 11th, 1955, the Ministry of Geology held the first petroleum survey work conference in Beijing, lasting for 20 days. The conference determined that the main task of the Ministry of Geology was to strengthen geological surveys, propose oil prospecting prospects, delineate the most promising oil areas, provide exploration reserve bases, and decide to establish five petroleum survey brigades in Xinjiang, Qaidam, Ordos, Sichuan, and North China. Thus began the large-scale national petroleum survey work.
From May 22nd to October 10th, 1955, Huang Jiqing conducted a four-and-a-half-month field inspection and guidance in Xinjiang, Qaidam, and the western edge of the Ordos Basin. During this period, he delivered a report titled "On the Petroleum Prospects from the Geological Characteristics of the Northwestern Region" at Northwest University. From November 1st to December 2nd, Huang Jiqing went to Sichuan Petroleum Survey Brigade to guide fieldwork and delivered a report titled "Some Opinions on the Prospecting Directions and Policies for Oil Exploration in the Sichuan Basin" at the meeting of Sichuan Petroleum Exploration Bureau.
On January 20th, 1956, the Ministry of Geology held the second petroleum survey work conference in Beijing. Huang Jiqing delivered a report titled "Lessons and Suggestions for Future Work in Petroleum Survey Geological Work Over the Past Year," mainly explaining various methods for fieldwork, for the reference of geological personnel engaged in mapping, filling, and oil exploration.
It was during this year that the Survey Committee further expanded the scale and scope of oil and gas exploration, forming nine new petroleum survey brigades, vigorously conducting oil and gas surveys from the Gobi Desert in the west to the coast of the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea in the east, and from the Songliao Basin in the north to the plateaus of Yunnan, Guizhou, and Guangxi in the south.
In September 1956, the Survey Committee was reorganized into the Bureau of Petroleum Geology, with Huang Jiqing serving as the Chief Engineer and concurrently as the Deputy Director of the Institute of Geological Sciences of the Ministry of Geology. Feeling a heavy responsibility, he decided to compile a "China Oil Prospects Zoning Map." Based on the 1:3 million geological map of China edited by him, the map delineated oil prospecting zones, accompanied by a detailed explanatory text, serving as a reference for petroleum survey and exploration work. The prospecting map of China was completed in February 1957. On March 8th, Huang Jiqing presented the "China Oil-bearing Prospect Zone Map" at a professional conference of the Geological Department of the Ministry of Petroleum, along with an academic report titled "Preliminary Thoughts on the Oil and Gas Prospect Zone in China".
During the oil surveys in major basins, Huang Jiqing paid special attention to four major basins: Sichuan, Ordos, Songliao, and North China. He emphasized the search for oil and gas layers in the Mesozoic and Cenozoic strata in North China, suggested surveying along the Songhua River in the Songliao Basin, focusing on the western edge in the Ordos Basin, and conducting investigations in central and southern Sichuan Basin.
Thus, in the "China Oil-bearing Prospect Zone Map", he prominently marked these four major basins in a distinctive deep orange-red color, indicating them as the most prospective areas. The Tarim, Junggar, and Qaidam basins were also highlighted in specific colors, signifying their importance as oil-bearing regions.
The Miracle in the History of World Oil
After the first oil survey conference, as one of the technical heads of the survey committee, Huang Jiqing designated the Songliao Basin as an important remaining task. He instructed technician Su Yunshan to review materials and draft the "Petroleum Geological Survey Design Task Book for the Songliao Plain", which he personally revised and then issued to the Northeast Geological Bureau by the survey committee.
In August 1955, a survey team led by Han Jingxing began the petroleum survey of the Songliao Basin. They conducted investigations along the Songhua River and near the Shenyang-Harbin railway, discovering extensive outcrops of continental sandstones in the Songhua Group, including gray-black shales and microfossils potentially conducive to oil formation, which were later identified as belonging to the Cretaceous period.
Between 1956 and 1957, the Geological Department intensified surface geological and geophysical work in the Songliao Basin, aiming to understand the structural characteristics of the Cretaceous strata and potential oil-bearing rock formations. By early 1958, it was preliminarily concluded that the Songliao Basin was a highly prospective oil-bearing basin. On April 17, 1958, in Well 17 of the Yaojia Formation in Qian'guo County, Jilin Province, oil-bearing sandstones as thick as 70 cm and 50 cm were discovered, followed by drilling in many other locations that encountered oil-rich sandstone formations, indicating the excellent petroleum prospects of the Songliao Basin.
During the Spring Festival of 1959, a significant meeting was chaired by He Changgong, the then Vice Minister of the Geological Department, with the Minister of Petroleum Industry, Yu Qiuli, and Deputy Minister Kang Shien, among others, in attendance. Considering the likelihood of the Songliao Basin being a large oil and gas basin, the meeting decided that the Geological Department and the Petroleum Industry Department would collaborate in oil and gas exploration in the basin, conducting a joint exploration to comprehensively understand the stratigraphy and deep structure of the basin.
After the Spring Festival, Huang Jiqing met with geological workers such as Li Ben, Han Jingxing, and Lv Hua in Changchun, collecting and studying geological, geophysical, and drilling data from the Songliao Basin. On February 15, Huang Jiqing gave a speech titled "Direction of Oil Exploration in the Songliao Plain", proposing opinions on oil-bearing layers, reservoir layers, structural traps, and exploration directions, suggesting that the oil-bearing strata may not be single but multi-layered, advocating for deep drilling to conduct comprehensive petroleum geological research, and urging the arrangement of benchmark wells.
On September 26, Well 3 in Songji gushed out a large amount of crude oil, confirming that the Songliao Basin was a large economically viable oil-bearing area. During the tenth anniversary of the National Day celebrations, upon the suggestion of Ouyang Qin, the First Secretary of the Heilongjiang Provincial Party Committee, the Ministry of Petroleum Industry decided to name this oilfield, which changed the backward appearance of China's petroleum industry, as the "Daqing Oilfield".
In 1964, during the first session of the Third National People's Congress held in Beijing, Li Fuchun, the Vice Premier of the State Council, announced that the era of Chinese people using foreign oil was coming to an end. Huang Jiqing, as a delegate to the National People's Congress, explained the discovery process of the Daqing Oilfield from the perspective of earth sciences.
From the petroleum geological survey in 1955 to the oil production in 1959, it took only four years, and from the beginning of fieldwork to the initial establishment of the oilfield, it took only eight years. Such speed not only set a record in China but also in the history of world oil exploration.
The discovery of the Daqing Oilfield was the result of collective cooperation in the geological community, coordinated efforts of multiple departments, top-level design by academic authorities, on-site guidance, and hard work of technical experts and frontline workers, creating a miracle in the history of world oil.
In 1982, the "Earth Science Work in the Discovery Process of the Daqing Oilfield" won the first prize of the National Natural Science Award, and 23 geological workers who made important contributions to the discovery of the Daqing Oilfield were awarded. Huang Jiqing accepted the certificate on behalf of all the awardees.
Science Must Directly Serve the Economic Construction of the Country
In his later years, Huang Jiqing never stopped exploring, always concerned about China's oil development. In July 1984, the Chinese Petroleum Society held a symposium in Beijing, where Huang Jiqing once again emphasized in the "Suggestions for Increasing China's Oil and Gas Reserves" the multi-layered oil and gas deposition in large basins, particularly highlighting the Songliao Basin, North China Basin, and Northern Jiangsu Basin.
In September 1984, Huang Jiqing went to Urumqi to attend the third Tarim Oil and Gas Resources Symposium, delivering a lengthy speech on the structure of the Tarim Basin, main oil and gas-bearing strata, reservoir formations, types of oil and gas fields, and exploration directions.
He believed that oil-bearing strata may exist in the early Paleozoic, Carboniferous, Permian (mostly marine), Triassic, Jurassic, Cretaceous, and Tertiary (continental and marine transitional) periods. The main oil exploration zones are the Central Uplift Zone (including the Bachu Uplift), the Northern Uplift Zone, the Qiemo Uplift Zone, and their flanks, where major oil fields may be found. Surprisingly, less than a week after Huang Jiqing's report, the Northwest Petroleum Geological Bureau struck industrial oil and gas flows in Well 2 of the Northern Uplift Zone.
In 1986, at the age of 82, Huang Jiqing once again visited the Daqing Oilfield. Based on a detailed understanding of oilfield exploration and development, he provided detailed written opinions and suggestions for the work of the Daqing Oilfield. In April 1991, at the Fourth Session of the Seventh National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), Huang Jiqing delivered a speech titled "Building an Economic Special Zone in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region with a Focus on Developing Petroleum and Natural Gas in the Tarim Basin to Promote the Modernization of the Country." He estimated the prospects and geological reserves of oil and gas in the Tarim Basin and made several suggestions for the development of the region from geological and hydrological perspectives.
In 1994, Huang Jiqing, along with Qian Xuesen, Wang Ganchang, and Wang Daheng, was honored with the inaugural He Liang He Li Foundation Science and Technology Achievement Award. In his acceptance speech, he emphasized that "science should directly serve the economic construction of the country," expressing his hope for accelerated exploration and development of oil in the Tarim Basin and western China to find "successors" for the country's modernization in the 21st century. It's worth mentioning that in recent years, China National Petroleum Corporation (formerly the Ministry of Petroleum Industry) and China Petrochemical Corporation have achieved significant breakthroughs in oil and gas exploration in multiple locations in the north and central areas of the Tarim Basin.
With nearly 70 years of geological career, Huang Jiqing harbored the desire to "explore every piece of rock in the world," traveling thousands of miles on foot across mountains and valleys, meticulously studying and contributing significantly to the exploration and development of China's oil resources, and the discovery of major oil and gas fields such as the Songliao Basin and Bohai Bay Basin. His rigorous and practical academic attitude, solid theoretical foundation, and rich practical experience have earned him remarkable achievements, which have had a profound impact on the international geological community.
In commemoration of Huang Jiqing's outstanding contributions to the tectonics of China and petroleum geology, the International Astronomical Union approved the formal naming of asteroid number "215023" as "Huang Jiqing Star." Thus, in the vast universe, there shines a "Huang Jiqing Star," illuminating the course of history.
(From "China Science News," April 12, 2024, 4th Edition, imprint)
