China-Myanmar gas pipeline carries nearly 2 billion cubic metres in first year

The China-Myanmar gas pipeline owned by China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) has carried 1.87 billion cubic metres of gas to China and 60 million cubic metres of gas to Myanmar in its first year of operation.

The gas pipeline is part of a $2.5bn oil and gas project between the two countries. It carries gas over 2,400km, allowing China to avoid the busy Malacca Strait shipping lanes.

The pipeline stretches from the Shwe fields off the coast of Myanmar’s Rakhine state to Kunming, a south-western Chinese city. At full capacity, the pipeline is expected to transport around 12 billion cubic metres of gas a year.

CNPC is also deploying a parallel oil pipeline that is expected to be operational later this year, which will be capable of carrying around 440,000 barrels of oil a day.

CNPC recently signed a deal with CUPET to increase crude output and production sharing and for drilling services at Cuba’s offshore oilfields.

In June 2014, Myanmar announced amassing revenues of $3.3bn from gas exports in the last year and expects that number to grow with increased exports to China through the new and existing pipelines.