From RIA Novosti via Energy Daily, I noticed that The China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) will finance the construction of a pipeline across China, to supply Central Asian gas to the country’s south and east.

“…The 7,000 km (4,349 mile) pipeline with design capacity of 30 billion cubic meters per year is expected to go on-stream in 2010. Construction will start in 2008, the company said. The pipeline will start in the province of Xinjiang in China’s northwest, on the border with Central Asian states Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, and end at Guangzhou in the south, and Shanghai in the east, CNPC said. The pipeline will pump natural gas from Central Asia, mainly from gas-rich Turkmenistan.

In July, during Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov’s visit to China, CNPC and Turkmenistan’s national gas company Turkmengaz signed a purchase and sale agreement on natural gas supplies. Under the deal, the ex-Soviet country will supply 30 billion cubic meters of gas to China annually….”

Just another example of China’s increasing energy ties with Central Asia. Interesting that there has not been more linkage between Russia and China in the energy sphere.