Abstract: Oil shale, as an important substitute of energy resource, has caught people’s great attentions for its large resources and multipurpose utilizations. Oilshale deposits are found in America，Australia，Brazil，Russia，Canada，China, Estonian, etc. The oil shale formed in a variety of marine, continental, and lacustine depositional environments from Cambrian to Tertiary. According to the current world resources status of oil shale, total resources of oilshale deposits in 33 selected countries are estimated at 4 110×108 tons of shale oil. In China, oil shale resources have been found in 22 provinces (districts), 47 basins and 80 mines, and mostly concentrate in Jilin Province, Guangdong Province, Liaoning Province, Shandong Province, Xinjiang Municipality and Hainan Province. Most of oil shale in China formed in lacustine depositional environments during Cenozoic. On the base of improving technology, the best way for multipurpose utilization of oil shale is to integrate the oilrefining, chemicals production, generation of electricity, metal refining and building materials production. At this point, the oil shale has great multipurpose development potential.

Key words: oil shale, oil shale resource, substitute energy resource, multipurpose utilization, multipurpose development potential