'Iron Man of the New Era' passes away at 87

Wang Qimin, former assistant general manager and deputy chief geological engineer of Daqing Oilfield Co in Heilongjiang province, passed away on Monday in Langfang, Hebei province, at the age of 87, according to a statement of the company on Friday.

Wang, an eminent member of the Communist Party of China, and recipient of the national honorary titles such as "Role Model for the People", "Most Beautiful Striver", "Pioneer of Reform" was known as "Iron Man of the New Era".

Born in September 1937 in Huzhou, Zhejiang province, Wang embarked on his journey in petroleum industry in Daqing in 1961 after graduating from the Beijing Petroleum Institute, now known as China University of Petroleum.

From September 1961 to January 1978, he worked as a technician and geological engineer in the development department of Daqing Oilfield Research Institute.

While "Iron Man" Wang Jinxi braved the Daqing Oilfield in the 1960s, his successor Wang Qimin paved the way for his peers to high and stable production and sustainable development of the oilfield.

In the beginning, Wang faced several obstacles in his endeavor to develop the oilfields.

"The obstacles such as living in humble conditions and lacking research equipment need to be overcome," Wang told Heilongjiang Daily in an interview in 2019. "However, the theoretical gaps posed a significant challenge for the oilfield's scientific and technological workers."

In the following decade, he and his colleagues collected and analyzed over 10 million data points, creating the first underground oil-water saturation map during the high water content period in the oilfield.

The map revealed the basic laws of each water content period in the oilfield and led to the development of several advanced technologies, which gradually opened up a new frontier for advancing into low permeability oil layers, increasing oil reserves by nearly 1 billion metric tons. They also successfully developed and adjusted over 10,000 wells, ensuring the realization of the oilfield's first target of stable production of 50 million tons annually for 10 years.

In the 1990s, Wang proposed the implementation of "oil stabilization and water control" for high-water oilfields, which made an important contribution to the sustainable development of Daqing Oilfield with a high annual yield of more than 50 million tons in consecutive 27 years.

In 1997, the technology was awarded the special award of the National Science and Technology Progress Award.

By 2002, Daqing Oilfield had achieved annual crude oil production of over 50 million tons for 27 years, far surpassing the previous record of 12 years for the longest stable production period in similar oilfields worldwide.