payments to invest in the necessary Russian infrastructure, as
stated by Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak in May.
According to Gazprom President Alexi Miller, Russia will invest
US$55 billion for developing its eastern Siberian gas fields
and building the required Russian pipeline. As for the Chinese
section, China will reportedly spend at least US$20 billion.
The West Route gas pipeline
China and Russia have been discussing Russian gas exports
to China via the West Route gas pipeline, resulting in the
signing of a Framework Agreement by Gazprom Chairman
Alexey Miller and CNPC Chairman Zhou Jiping on 9 November
2014 on the sidelines of the APEC summit meeting in
Beijing. The specifics of the deal for exporting an additional
30 billion m
3
/yr of Russian gas from West Siberia to northwest
China for 30 years beginning 2019 are unknown. Yet, there are
suggestions as to its realisation via a pipeline (around 2600 km)
from a compressor station south of Novy Urengoi in the
Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug and across Russia’s Republic
of Altai to China.
The Central Asian Gas Pipeline System
(CAGPS)
The CAGPS is the world’s largest ongoing pipeline project and
consists of four sections (Lines A-D) through which Central
Asian gas (mainly Turkmen, but also Kazakh and Uzbek) will be
exported to China. Once fully operational by 2018, it will supply
85 billion m
3
/yr of gas to China equal to around 40% of its gas
imports.
Of its four lines, Lines A and B (each 1830 km; 42 in.)
became operational in December 2009 and October
2010, respectively. Their delivery capacity hit the volume
of 30 billion m
3
/yr by the end of 2011. The parallel lines
connect Turkmenistan to southern Kazakhstan through
Uzbekistan and cross the Kazakh-Chinese border at
the border pass of Horgos in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur
Autonomous Region.
Line C (1830 km; 48 in.) went on line in May 2014 less
than two years after its construction begun (September
2012). Increasing the CAGPS’s export capacity by an
additional 25 billion m
3
/yr, it begins on the Turkmenistan-
Uzbekistan border, runs through Kazakhstan and ends in
Xinjiang.
For Line D (1000 km; 48 in.), the Chinese Government
signed inter-governmental agreements with Uzbekistan,
Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan in September 2013 to increase its gas
imports from Central Asia by 30 billion m
3
/yr. The line links
Turkmenistan across Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan to
China. Set for completion in 2016, its construction was started
in September 2014 during a ceremony in Tajikistan’s Roudaki
district attended by Tajik President Emomali Rahmon and his
Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.
CNPC’s subsidiary, Trans-Asia Gas Pipeline Company Ltd
(Trans-Asia Gas) and Tojiktransgaz (Tajik state-run natural gas
distributor) signed an agreement on launching a joint venture
for its construction and operation in March 2014. CNPC is
funding its construction and Tojiktransgaz is the project’s
co-participant.
The Myanmar-China Crude Oil Pipeline
(MCCOP)
The MCCOP is a major Chinese pipeline not because of its
capacity and length, but its significance for China’s energy
security. China has long been concerned about the possibility
of the closure of the Strait of Malacca, since it receives
through the strait the bulk of its oil and LNG imports from its
largest suppliers in the Persian Gulf, North and South Africa
and Yemen. To decrease such a threat’s impact on its energy
security, it has sought to reduce its dependency on sea-
based imports by increasing its piped petroleum imports and
bypassing the Strait of Malacca for importing a part of the
supplies from the mentioned suppliers. The MCCOP is meant
for the latter objective, through which China will import a
significant amount of oil through its neighbouring Myanmar.
In September 2014 CNPC announced the completion of
the pipeline’s construction connecting Made Island, on the
west coast of Myanmar, to Kunming via Ruili, the capital
of Yunnan Province and its border city with Myanmar,
respectively. Its Myanmar and China sections are 770.5 km and
1631 km, respectively.
The joint venture of CNPC and Myanmar Oil and Gas
Enterprise (MOGE) has a daily capacity of 440 000 bpd while
its annual capacity is 22 or 23 million t of crude oil, according
to different reports. CNPC holds a 50.9% stake in the project
and manages it, leaving the rest for MOGE.
In absence of news on its operation in December 2014, it is
unclear whether the MCCOP could actually start operation as
planned (end of 2014) given there are reports as to a delay by
2016 for building a major oil refinery (200 000 bpd) in Kunming
meant to be supplied by it.
The Third West-to-East Natural Gas Pipeline
(TWENGP)
China needs to expand its domestic pipeline network to
facilitate the distribution of its imported and locally produced
petroleum. It has therefore embarked on a series of major
projects, including West-to-East Natural Gas Pipelines, meant
mainly for distributing the imported Central Asian gas from
China’s Xinjiang neighbouring Central Asia.
The TWENGP’s construction, which started in October
2012, is a major undertaking of CNPC, at the cost of
US$14.6 billion. The pipeline system has one trunk and eight
branches to connect Horgos in Xinjiang to Fuzhou in Fujian
via Zhongwei in Ningxia, with a total length of 7378 km. The
system also includes three gas storages and one LNG station
to be built. The trunkline (5220 km; 1016 - 1219 mm) has an
annual capacity of 30 billion m
3
.
The pipeline project is divided into three parts, namely:
the western part (Horgos to Zhongwei); the central part
(Zhongwei to Ji’an in Jiangxi); and the eastern part (Ji’an to
Fuzhou) to be operational at the end of 2013, by 2015 and 2014,
respectively.
Reportedly, the TWENGP and the First and Second West-
East Gas Pipelines will increase the share of natural gas in
China’s primary energy consumption by more than 2% to help
china reduce its CO
2
emissions whose main source is its heavy
consumption of coal for power generation.
16
World Pipelines
/
JANUARY 2015
