MOSCOW, December 2. /TASS/. Gazprom and China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) plan to develop cooperation in the sphere of underground gas storage in China to ensure reliable natural gas supplies from Russia, the Russian state-controlled energy giant said in a statement following a meeting of the companies’ joint coordination committee.
The sides discussed a wide range of urgent issues of gas cooperation, in particular, the course of implementation of a project to supply natural gas from Russia to China along the “eastern” route.
The participants agreed to consecutively expand interaction areas and stated the presence of considerable prospects in such spheres as gas generation, the use of gas as motor fuel, the use of space communications at gas industry facilities, supplies of equipment and providing services during joint project implementation.
On May 21, 2014, Gazprom and CNPC signed a gas purchase/sale agreement along the “eastern” route. The deal, signed for 30 years, stipulates supplies to China of 38 billion cubic meters of Russian gas annually.
On November 9, Gazprom and CNPC signed an agreement on gas supplies along the “western” route, which envisions the supply of 30 billion cu m of gas to China annually from West Siberia deposits via the Altai gas pipeline.