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China boasts abundant marine resources. Scattered in the offshore waters are sedimentation basins, with a total area of nearly 700,000 square km, estimated to contain about 24 billion tons of oil reserves and 14 trillion cubic meters of natural gas. Fishing grounds in China's territorial seas cover 2.8 million square km. There are 2.6 million hectares of shallow seas, with a depth of 20 meters or below, suitable for aquaculture, of which 710,000 hectares have already been used for this purpose. Of the 2.42 million hectares of tidal lands suitable for aquaculture, 550,000 hectares have been used for the purpose. China has obtained an exclusive exploration and development area of 75,000 square km, rich in polymetallic nodule deposits, in the international seabed region, with polymetallic nodule reserves exceeding 500 million tons.
Salt fields China now has more than 50 salt fields along its coast, with a combined acreage of 337,000 hectares. Sea salt constitutes over 70 percent of China's total production of crude salt.
Marine energy utilization China's tidal energy reserves amount to 110 million kw, 21 million kw of it being exploitable, which can be used to generate 58 billion kwh of power annually. Having larger tidal ranges, Zhejiang and Fujian provinces account for 80 percent of the nation's total coastal tidal energy resources. The Qiantangjiang estuary in Zhejiang has a tidal range of 8.9 meters and is an ideal place for a tidal power plant.
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