China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC) aims to more than double natural gas output at its Southwest gas field in Sichuan province to 50 billion cubic meters (Bcm) by 2025, the company said in a statement.

The field produced 22.63 Bcm of natural gas in 2018, and the company expects the output to reach 30 Bcm in 2020. CNPC plans to deploy more advanced technology to improve the efficiency of old gas wells and to build more ultra-deep wells, it said.

China’s state energy giants are set to raise spending on domestic drilling this year to the highest levels since 2016 in an effort to increase natural gas reserves to boost local supplies.

Sichuan province has proven natural gas reserves of 3.73 trillion cubic meters, the company said.

China produced 161.02 Bcm natural gas in 2018, up 7.5% from previous year, official data showed.