Secret Uzbek-Chinese Gas Deal Revealed

Uzbekistan revealed Monday it had secretly signed a gas supply contract with China in October, media reports in China said..

The deal was kept under wraps until this week.

Uzbekistan’s state-run gas transportation and supply company Uztransgaz signed the deal with China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) subsidiary PetroChina International Company.

However, details pertaining to the purchase price, volumes, or terms of the gas export contract were not revealed.

However these reports suggest the deal envisages the supply of 10 billion cubic meters (bcm) of Uzbek gas, beginning in early 2012.

Meanwhile, work on Line C of the Central Asian Gas Pipeline in central Uzbekistan began last week.

Line C, with a design capacity of 25 billion cubic meters per year, will be laid alongside Lines A and B which are currently shipping gas supplies to China from Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Kazakhstan.

Nearly 330 miles of the pipeline will be laid across Uzbek territory. The 1,143-mile pipeline is expected to go online in early 2014.