China’s state-owned oil and gas major and top refiner Sinopec is ramping up exploration in the shale formations of the Sichuan basin with a view to increasing the country’s shale gas production by a third over the next ten years. Currently, China’s shale gas total is below government targets, Reuters noted in a report on the news, adding shale gas represents only a tenth of China’s total natural gas production. Beijing has a shale gas output target of 80 to 100 billion cu m by 2030.