Specifically, the depth of the hole will be around 10,000 meters in an oil-rich Xinjiang region of China. It is noted that the deepest man-made hole on Earth is still the Russian Kola Peninsula Drilling, which reached a depth of 12,262 meters in 1989, after 20 years of drilling.
The venture is being led by scientists as a means of promoting China’s Earth exploration project launched by President Xi Jinping in 2021, Xinhua news agency reported.
Drilling of China’s deepest hole has begun in the Tarim Basin, near the country’s Tarim oil field.
Sun Jinsheng, a scientist at the Chinese Academy of Engineering, said the project will penetrate more than 10 layers of rock in the Earth’s crust that will have stones dating back about 145 million years.
An extremely dangerous venture
Jinsheng, however, noted that a project of this size can be quite dangerous, with the risks heightened given that the excavation site is located in the Takla Makan desert, which is characterized by a wild environment and complex underground conditions.
The drilling is expected to last about 457 days and is being led by China National Petroleum Corp, which will use the project to test underground drilling machines and gather data about the Earth’s interior.
