Gazprom CEO Visits China to Discuss Gas Sales
A Gazprom delegation headed by CEO Alexei Miller paid a working visit to China on March 22. He met Zhang Gaoli, the first vice premier of China's state council. "The parties addressed strategic bilateral cooperation. It was noted that the collaboration between Gazprom and Chinese energy companies and financial institutions was consistently developing," Gazprom said in a statement.
The meeting discussed issues related to pipeline exports of Russian gas to China. In particular, the meeting focused on the eastern and western routes. Progress was recorded in all areas of cooperation, Gazprom said,
Miller also met and his counterpart at CNPC Wang Yilin. "Particular attention was given to gas exports to China via the western route," Gazprom said.
The western route is Gazprom's preferred delivery method as western Siberian gas fields which are under development would be the source of the gas. But it would bring the gas to a point on the Russia-China border somewhere between Kazakhstan and Mongolia
This would entail a longer pipeline to China's demand in the east, than would the eastern route, where gas will be carried from giant fields in eastern Siberia to China by an agreed route called Power of Siberia and so it is less attractive to China.
A few days before Miller met Yilin, their deputies Vitali Markelov and Wang Dongjin, met in Beijing March 18 to discuss the progress of that route. "They also addressed prospective collaboration in the field of underground gas storage in China, power generation, and use of gas as a vehicle fuel," Gazprom said.
On March 20, Total CEO Patrick Pouyanne and CNPC chairman Wang Yilin signed a strategic cooperation agreement in Beijing to extend further the existing cooperation between their two companies in ventures that include Yamal LNG in Russia, the Kashagan oil field in Kazakhstan, the Libra oil field offshore Brazil, the Sulige gas field in the Chinese province of Inner Mongolia, and Halfaya in Iraq. Yamal LNG shareholders are Russia's Novatek 50.1%, Total and CNPC each with 20%, and 9.9% held by China's Silk Road Fund.
William Powell