Why is China drilling a 10,000 meter deep hole into the earth's crust?

Bloomberg reported on May 31 that the move was made in the context of China wanting to explore new frontiers on and below the surface of the blue planet.

Xinhua news agency said this is the deepest hole China has ever drilled into the earth's crust to date.

Drilling began in China’s oil-rich Xinjiang region on May 30. Earlier that morning, China launched its first civilian astronaut into space from the Gobi Desert.

Tại sao Trung Quốc khoan lỗ sâu 10.000 m vào vỏ trái đất? - Ảnh 1.

The deepest man-made hole on Earth is still Russia's "Kola Superdeep Borehole." Photo: Bloomberg

The wormhole will penetrate more than 10 continental strata or rock layers and reach the Cretaceous system in the Earth's crust, where rocks date back about 145 million years, Xinhua reported.

"The difficulty of this drilling project can be compared to a large truck running on two thin steel cables," Sun Jinsheng, a scientist at the Chinese Academy of Engineering, told Xinhua.

In a speech to some of the country's top scientists in 2021, Chinese President Xi Jinping called on Beijing to make more progress in deep-Earth exploration.

Jobs like deep hole drilling can help identify mineral and energy resources, and help assess the risks of environmental disasters, such as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

The deepest man-made hole on Earth is still Russia's "Kola Superdeep Borehole", which reached a depth of 12,262 m in 1989. It took Russia 20 years to complete the Kola Deep Hole.

Pham Nghia

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