The rare energy reserves of the world in the Bay Area of ​​the Yellow River

The Yellow River forms the “Qi” Bay Basin through the five provinces of Gansu, Ningxia, Inner Mongolia, Shaanxi and Shanxi, including Baiyin, Pingliang, Qingyang, Shizuishan, Zhongwei, Wuzhong, Yinchuan, Hohhot, Erlianhaote, and Alashan. There are 21 cities (counties) such as Zuoqi, Ordos, Baotou, Wuhai, Bayannur, Yan'an, Yulin, Datong, Zhangzhou, Zhangzhou, Luliang, and Linyi, and Ningdong Energy and Chemical Industry Base, with a total area of ​​570,000 square kilometers.

According to the data provided by the Yellow River Bay Innovation and Development Macroeconomic Strategic Research Group, at present, the proven reserves of the Yellow River in the Jichang Bay Basin are 808.397 billion tons, accounting for 66.5% of the country's total reserves. Among the 13 large-scale coal bases identified by the State, Six of them are concentrated in this region; natural gas has proven reserves of 288 million cubic meters, accounting for 37.8% of the country's total reserves; crude oil has proven reserves of 2.16 billion tons, accounting for approximately 7.5% of the country's total reserves; reserves of sodium salt 8854 Billion tons, accounting for about 70% of the country's total reserves; iron ore, bauxite, silica and other resources are also abundant reserves.

Thanks to abundant resources and resources, in the past 10 years since the western development, the infrastructure construction in this region has made breakthrough progress. The economic growth rate is obviously higher than other areas in the central and western regions. It is the fastest growing region in the Chinese economy and even the global economy. one.

At the same time, this region is an important window for exchanges and cooperation with Mongolia, Russia, Northeast Asia, and Arab countries. It is also an important base for West-East coal transport, West-East gas transmission, and West-to-East power transmission. In the “Eleventh Five-Year Plan” period alone, this region mobilized energy that accounts for more than half of China's total energy output, with less than 6% of the country’s land area.

The rare energy enrichment has made the Jichang Bay area of ​​the Yellow River known as the “Ugl River Delta” in the hinterland of China. However, due to the similar resource endowment in this region, the convergence of industrial structure and the division of 5 provinces and regions, the fragmentation and disorderly competition have severely restricted the overall benefits of the region, resulting in many adverse consequences.

First of all, the single industrial structure has greatly increased the industrial operating costs and risks, inhibited the company's ability to innovate, and made it difficult to integrate and recycle resources. Here, coal companies generally suffer from a serious shortage of technology development funds. Technological innovation investment is less than 1% of corporate sales, and high-tech talent is lacking. Almost all cities and regions in this region are building wind power projects, but they are constrained by transmission grids, and the operation of wind turbines is severely inadequate, which causes huge operational risks for this type of projects.

Second, it is difficult to form a reasonable system of division of labor and cooperation. Enterprises are driven by profits, pursue short-term benefits, and have serious destruction and waste of resources. The issue of safety production is outstanding. As coal prices continue to rise, increasing production has become the company's top priority, and their actions such as self-administration, unlicensed mining, over-exploration, indiscriminate mining, and illegal transfer of mining rights have occurred from time to time. This has not only caused great damage to the resources, but also resulted in waste. It also poses a great danger to safety production.

In addition, it can easily lead to severe market fluctuations, increase the difficulty of national macro-control and national operating costs, and bring serious risks to the sustainable use of resources and sustainable economic and social development. The disorderly competition among several interest groups makes it difficult to control costs and prices. Taking the highly concentrated coal-fired power generation enterprises in the region as an example, with the exception of a few mine pit power plants that have a meager profit, most of the remaining power plants have serious losses due to the difficulty in controlling the cost of raw coal and the volatility in the online prices. The average debt to asset ratio is over 100%. Up to 150%.

At the same time, as an energy-rich region, it has not been able to form a strong international discourse, and the overall economic development level is low. Compared with the entire country, especially compared with the eastern coastal areas, the area is an economically underdeveloped border area. This has a close relationship with the region's long-term focus on resource development, the underdeveloped processing industry, and the lack of a sound development mechanism.

In the end, the deterioration of the ecological environment is aggravated The "Ji" Bay area of ​​the Yellow River is located in a semi-arid area, and is also a concentrated output area of ​​the Yellow River sediment. It is necessary to speed up overall planning and achieve efficient use of water resources in order to optimize the ecological environment in the region and the downstream.

This series of problems cannot be fundamentally resolved by the efforts of one place alone. Only by establishing a unified coordination mechanism across administrative regions at the national level can we ensure the sustained and stable economic, social, and harmonious development of the region.

Hu Zhengxuan, head of the Macroeconomic Strategy Research Group of the Yellow River Gulf Innovation Development, told the Economic Information Daily that at present, the “Jiu” Bay area of ​​the Yellow River is ushering in a rare opportunity for potential breakthroughs. On the one hand, with the continuous development of the national policy of expanding domestic demand, this region can take advantage of energy enrichment and a broad market, and expand the development space at a new starting point; on the other hand, domestic and foreign industrial adjustments and cross-regional restructuring continue to deepen. It also provides opportunities for the region to undertake the transfer of coastal areas and international industries and promote the optimization and upgrading of industrial structure.

To this end, experts from the Macro Strategy Research Group suggested that we must seize the opportunity and create a potential problem. To establish a mechanism for economic cooperation in the Yellow Sea Bay as soon as possible, study and formulate a coordination mechanism for regional cooperation among the five provinces and regions, coordinate major issues in regional development, take the lead in formulating mid- and long-term development plans and related major policies, and provide support from policies, funds, etc., to build a China Hinterland economic circle.

Experts in the Macro Strategy Research Group have positioned this hinterland economic circle in four directions:

The first is another "growth pole" in the rapid development of the central and western regions. Taking the modernized urbanization of new industrialization, agriculture and animal husbandry as the lead, and taking full advantage of comparative advantages as the main line, we will vigorously optimize the industrial structure and achieve a leap-forward economic and social development. We will make this region a new “growth pole” for the development of the Midwest. The strategic support points for the coordinated development of the country's regions.

The second is to open up an important window of openness. Give full play to the role of the Yellow River Bay as a bridgehead and corridor opening to the west and north, deepen China-Asia economic cooperation, and focus on promoting the construction of export processing bases and regional international trade centers for Central Asia, West Asia, and even European countries, and accelerating the undertaking The pace of domestic industry transfer has led to the formation of an innovative platform for Donglian Xiexi and Beirong Nantong and a strategic base for opening to the west and north.

The third is the important energy raw material supply base in the country. Orderly efforts will be made to strengthen the construction of the coal and oil and gas industry chain and the development of new energy sources. This area will be built into an integrated energy supply base integrating coal, electricity, coal-based natural gas, natural gas, refined oil, wind power and photovoltaic power generation. Actively use the abundant mineral resources in northwest China and Central Asia to build this area into a raw material industrial base based on synthetic materials and a new energy R&D and supply base.

The fourth is to ensure the strategic location of the ****. Taking the new round of large-scale western development as a turning point, taking the multi-ethnic culture and symbiosis as the core, and accelerating the opening-up to the outside world and economic and social development, it will promote the regional economic development of the Yellow River Bay and build it into the peaceful development of Central Asia, West Asia, and Northeast Asia. The "stabilizer" and the "engine" of economic development have established strategic barriers for the security of China's central and western frontiers.