May 22, 1999
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| May 22, 1999 | atimes.com | |
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| China $2.3bn West China-Kazakhstan pipeline on the fast track BEIJING - China is speeding up construction of a 4,300-kilometer oil pipeline connecting the western parts of the country with Khazakhstan. According to Wu Yaowen, vice-president of the China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), the pipeline project - which is expected to cost a total of $2.3 billion - will help China to carry out its energy strategy in developing oil in western parts, and in the meantime explore and utilize oil resources in foreign countries. The official said that the international section of the pipeline will extend 3,000 kilometers from Karamay in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and end in Khazakhstan. ''When completed in eight years, the pipeline is expected to transport 25 million tons of oil from Khazakstan to China annually, '' he added. The pipeline's domestic section starts from Korla, north of the Tarim Desert. After arriving at Lanzhou, a major petrochemical industrial center in northwest China's Gansu province, the pipeline will go east to central China's Henan province in one direction and to southwest China's Sichuan province in another. China's northwest provinces of Shaanxi, Gansu and Qinghai and autonomous regions of Ningxia and Xinjiang together have one third of the country's total oil reserves. The region is expected to produce one fifth of China's total oil output in three years. Khazakhstan, which borders Xinjiang Uigur Autonomous Region, is very rich in oil and gas resources, and is expected to be one of the world's six largest petroleum producers within 10 years. The official said that the pipeline will not only help China import oil from Khazakhstan, but will also ease oil transportation in the western parts of China. At present, a 482-kilometer section of the pipeline from Korla to Shanshan within Xinjiang has been completed, and the construction of the pipeline from Xinjiang's Shanshan to Luoyang in Henan and Pengzhou in Sichuan is in full swing. (Asia Pulse/XIC) | |||||||||
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