Chuhuangkeng Oil Mine

Chuhuangkeng (出磺坑), located along the Houlong River in Gongguan Township, Miaoli County, is Taiwan's oldest petroleum extraction site and one of the most historically significant industrial heritage locations in East Asia. The name literally means 'sulfur-emitting pit,' as early settlers mistook the yellowish crude oil seeping from the ground for sulfur.

The history of oil extraction at Chuhuangkeng dates to 1817, when local resident Wu Linfang (吳琳芳) first noticed oil floating on the surface of the Houlong River. In 1861, Qiu Gou (邱苟), an interpreter for indigenous affairs, hand-dug the first oil well at the site — just two years after Edwin Drake's pioneering well in Titusville, Pennsylvania, which is why Chuhuangkeng is often described as the second oil well in world history and the first in Asia, although wells elsewhere in Asia, such as at Baku, were earlier. In 1877 the Qing government took over the operation and hired American technicians to drill with machinery.

Following Japan's colonization of Taiwan in 1895, the Japanese government recognized the strategic value of Chuhuangkeng's petroleum reserves. From 1897, both public and private enterprises were authorized to apply for oil field concessions. Japanese oil companies — from 1903 a Taiwan petroleum company that obtained the mining rights, and later firms such as Japan Petroleum Company (日本石油株式会社) — ran operations and introduced modern drilling technology, which enabled wells to reach much deeper strata and overcome the depletion of shallow oil reserves. In 1927 annual production peaked at about 22,830 kiloliters — the highest in the site's history — after which the field gradually declined.

During World War II, Chuhuangkeng remained of value to Japan's war effort as a source of petroleum within the empire, although output had fallen from its 1927 peak. About 99 wells are said to have been drilled during the Japanese period. The site's infrastructure, including Japanese-era dormitories, offices, a medical clinic, and heavy machinery maintenance facilities, reflected the scale of the colonial-period industrial operation.

After Japan's surrender in 1945, the Chinese Petroleum Corporation (CPC, now CPC Corporation, Taiwan) took over all petroleum facilities on the island. In 1952, CPC struck oil and gas on the eastern flank of the old field, and in the 1970s it successfully developed new oil and gas reservoirs in deeper geological formations. Today Chuhuangkeng remains an active production site, mainly for natural gas. The Taiwan Oil Field Exhibition Hall (台灣油礦陳列館), first established in 1981 and given its present name and building in 1990, preserves the site's heritage, including Japanese colonial-era structures designated as cultural assets; Miaoli County registered Chuhuangkeng as a cultural landscape in 2008. The area has been developed into a commemorative park that tells the story of over 160 years of petroleum history.