BEIJING, Ocober 9. /TASS/. China's CNPC has received government permission to start a preliminary engineering project of the Chinese part of Russia’s Power of Siberia gas pipeline and will start laying the pipeline in January-June 2015, the company said in a statement Thursday.

The construction of the part going from the city of Heihe in northeast China to Shanghai will be finished and Power of Siberia will be launched in 2018.

The construction of the Russian part of the pipeline began on September 1.

Russia-China gas contract

In May, Gazprom signed a US $400 billion 30-year contract with CNPC. to supply 38 billion cubic meters of gas per year to China. The contract envisages delivery of 38 billion cubic meters of natural gas to China annually.

In 2014, Russia may also sign a deal to supply 30 billion cubic meters of gas to China via the western route connecting fields in the Western Siberia with Northwest China through the Altai republic, several government and Gazprom officials said earlier.

Power of Siberia gas pipeline

The Power of Siberia gas pipeline estimated at $21.3 billion is intended to pump 61 billion cubic meters of natural gas annually and will stretch over a distance of 3,968 km (2,465 miles).

The pipeline is designed to pump natural gas from the giant Chayanda oil and gas condensate deposit in Yakutia in northeast Russia and the Kovykta gas condensate field in the Irkutsk Region in Eastern Siberia. The Power of Siberia will run along the operational East Siberia - Pacific oil pipeline, crossing marshlands, mountainous and seismically active areas.

The first stage envisages the construction of the Yakutia-Khabarovsk-Vladivostok trunk gas pipeline. During the second stage, the Irkutsk gas production center based on the Kovykta deposit will be connected with the Yakutia center based on the Chayanda field.

The gas pipeline’s first stage is scheduled to be commissioned in 2017.

The Chayanda oil and gas condensate field in the Lensky district of Yakutia was discovered in 1989. The field, one of Russia’s largest undeveloped deposits, holds about 1.45 trillion cubic meters of natural gas and 93 million tons of liquid hydrocarbons. The field is expected to produce up to 25 billion cubic meters of natural gas and at least 1.5 million tons of oil annually.

The Kovykta gas condensate deposit discovered in 1987 is located in the north of the Irkutsk Region. The deposit’s reserves are estimated at 1.9 trillion cubic meters of natural gas, 2.3 billion cubic meters of helium and 115 million tons of liquid gas condensate.