HONG KONG, Feb. 9 (UPI) -- The China National Offshore Oil Corp. announced the discovery of natural gas at its deepwater LiuHua exploration block in the South China Sea.

CNOOC and its partners at Husky Oil China Ltd., a subsidiary of Husky Energy, said they encountered a gas pay with a total thickness of 229 feet.

The company said the well tested at a preliminary rate of 57 million cubic feet of natural gas per day.

The discovery, LH 29-1, is the third discovery for CNOOC in the Pearl River Mouth Basin in the eastern waters of the South China Sea.

"Deepwater is one of our major exploration efforts this year," said Zhu Weilin, a CNOOC vice president of exploration. "The successive deepwater discoveries made in the South China Sea will further encourage us to carry out our deepwater exploration activities."

The field was drilled to a depth of 10,928 feet in a water depth of about 2,360 feet. Husky is scheduled to appraise LH 29-1 later in 2010 to determine the size of the discovery.

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