BEIJING, July 15 (Xinhuanet) -- PetroChina Company Limited, a listed company of the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC),China's largest oil and natural gas producer, announced Friday that its crude oil output reached 396 million barrels in the first six months of 2005, 2.1 percent higher year on year.

    Thanks to the soaring international oil price and thriving domestic market demand, PetroChina saw an all-around growth in itsproduction sectors in the first half of 2005.

    PetroChina has fulfilled over half of its crude oil output goalin the first six months, 8.1 million barrels more than the same period of last year. Its output of marketable natural gas was 506.3 billion cubic feet, 96 billion cubic feet more than the first half of 2004 with a year-on-year growth of 23.4 percent.

    In the exploitation and mining sector, PetroChina has made a great breakthrough in the Bohai Bay Basin and in such regions as the Ordos Basin in North China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region,northeastern Songliao Basin, the heart of Sichuan Province and theTarim Basin.

    In the oil refining sector, PetroChina processed 378.9 million barrels of crude oil in the first half of 2005, an increase of 26.2 million barrels, or 7.4 percent, compared with the same period of last year.

    PetroChina's outputs of gasoline and diesel oil were 10.72 million tons and 21.64 million tons respectively, up by 2.3 percent and 11.9 percent.

    PetroChina continued to expand its oil product marketing network in the first six months of 2005. Now PetroChina boasts 17,215 gas stations across the country, 538 more than the number in last year's same period.

    In the chemical sector, PetroChina produced 941,000 tons of ethylene, 142,000 tons of synthetic rubber and 1.31 million tons of synthetic resin.

    During the first half of 2005, PetroChina saw rapid developmentin construction of key oil and natural gas pipelines.

    The 931-km-long natural gas pipeline linking northwest China's Shaanxi Province with Beijing started operation on July 1. With anannual transmission capacity of 12 billion cubic meters, the pipeline is expected to greatly increase the gas supply capacity for China's capital and North China.

    The subsidiary and transmission sections of the projects pumping natural gas from China's energy-rich western region to energy-thirsty eastern region are making headway in line with the plan.

    To expand its overseas business, PetroChina announced in June it would acquire the overseas assets of its parent company, CNPC. After the acquisition, PetroChina is expected to further increase its value by expanding its overseas oil and natural gas growth space and potential.

    PetroChina predicted that the company will have a favorable macro-environment in the second half year despite some uncertaintyand unpredictable factors.

    PetroChina aims to enhance its inner management and increase its operation efficiency to create better conditions for further development. Enditem