BAKU, Azerbaijan, February 21. Asia's natural gas demand in 2023 is expected to rise by almost 3 percent, Trend reports via the latest overview of European gas market from the International Energy Agency (IEA).
According to the agency, this growth will be mainly driven by growing demand in China and India.
Thus, after falling by 0.7 percent, or 2.5 bcm, for the first time since 1982, China's gas demand is forecast to rebound and increase by 6.5 percent, or 24 bcm, in 2023, primarily due to recovery in economic activity after lifting COVID-19 restrictions.
At the same time, in 2022, China's LNG imports dropped by 21 percent, or 22 bcm, which allowed Europe to increase its imports.
"Our base forecast anticipates China’s LNG imports to increase by 10 percent, or 8 bcm, to reach 94 bcm in 2023, although this is subject to a wide range of uncertainty. Our analysis indicates that a set of only moderately bearish assumptions on total gas consumption, domestic production and pipeline gas imports could depress LNG demand by another 12 percent, 10 bcm, in 2023, whereas a confluence of modestly bullish conditions could boost China’s LNG intake by 35 percent (30 bcm) to wellabove the previous peak in 2021. The total uncertainty range is about 40 bcm," the IEA added.
Meanwhile, India's gas consumption is expected to grow by 3 percent, due to increase in gas burn in the power sector and an ongoing, although slow, increase in the industrial and city gas sectors.
"In Japan, gas demand is expected to decrease by nearly 4 percent amidst growing solar and higher nuclear output (thanks to additional restarts and improving operating rates of already restarted units). Korea’s natural gas demand in 2023 is projected to decrease by another 2 percent, driven by lower gas burn in the power sector amidst the start-up of 2.1 GW of new coal-fired capacity, the restart of the 1 GW Hanbit 4 nuclear unit after and the commissioning of the 1.4 GW Shin Hanul 1 nuclear block scheduled for H2 2023," the report added.