Uzbekistan, Tashkent, March 30 /Trend D.Azizov/
Uzbekistan will start exporting natural gas to China from April 1, Uzbekneftegaz Chairman Shokir Faizullaev said during the signing of an agreement betwween LUKOIL Overseas Uzbekistan Ltd. and a consortium of banks for the Kandym-Khauzak-Shady project on Friday.
"A part of the volume of Uzbek gas will be supplied to China as of April 1," Faizullaev said.
He did not say how much gas will be exported to China this year.
As previously reported, in June 2010, China and Uzbekistan signed a framework agreement for the sale of Uzbek natural gas, according to which China will buy 10 billion cubic meters of natural gas from Uzbekistan annually.
The construction of Central Asia-China pipeline was started in 2008. Its total length is about seven thousand kilometers, diameter - 1067 mm, the bandwidth of the two branches of the pipeline is 30 billion cubic meters of gas per year. The length of the pipeline in the territory of Uzbekistan is 525 kilometers.
The first of the two branches of the pipeline was commissioned in December 2009, the construction of a second gas pipeline completed in 2010.
The pipeline is intended for export of natural gas to China from Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.
In December last year, Uzbekistan and China started the construction of the third branch of gas pipeline Central Asia-China.
The length of the section passing through the territory of Uzbekistan is 529 kilometers. The design capacity of the third branch is 25 billion cubic meters of gas per year.
As expected, the supply of gas by the third branch of the pipeline will begin in January 2014 and will reach the planned capacity in December 2015.
Financing of the project worth about $ 2.2 billion will be financed by loans from the State Development Bank of China, as well as direct investment of China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC).
Uzbekistan ranks third for natural gas production among the CIS countries and among the ten largest gas-producing countries. About 60 billion cubic meters of gas produced in the country every year