2023-06-13 16:02:36
Since May 30, the Chine embarked on the digging of a 10 km hole under the Terre. A drilling rig was designed for the occasion. Weighing 2,000 tons and capable of withstanding a temperature of 200°C, the machine took place in the northwest of China, in the middle of the desert, in the Tarim Basin. Objective ? There Scientific Research but also the search for energy resources, specifies the Huff Post.
The project, which is scheduled for 457 days, is led by the China National Petroleum Corporation, the main producer of oil and gas from the country. This desert contains deposits of minerals and hydrocarbons. So much so that by drilling so deeply, the Chinese hope to hit a seam. beijing is attached to its energy independence and finding new resources is not negligible.
Touching Cretaceous rocks
But the Chinese are also carrying out this project with scientific aims. By digging so deeply, ten continental layers will be crossed by the drill. At the lowest point, the craft reach rocks dating from the Cretaceous geological era. This takes us back 145 million years, when the dinosaurs were still treading the earth.
Reaching 10 km in 457 days remains an ambitious challenge. The deepest drilling goes to the Russia. It is a hole of 12,262 meters dug in the time of theUSSR, from 1970 to 1989. The goal of the Soviets was to reach 15 km of depth, that is to say the limit between the earth’s crust and the upper mantle of the Earth. But the project, which therefore lasted nearly 20 years, was stopped due to a lack of funding.
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