China will triple the total length of its natural gas pipelines in the next five years to meet rising demand, said industry insiders.

The total length of natural gas pipelines in the country will reach 100,000 km by the end of 2015, compared with 36,000 km by the end of 2010, said Yang Jianhong, deputy director of the oil and gas pipeline department at the China Petroleum Planning and Engineering Institute.

The country's pipelines currently transport more than 100 billion cubic meters (cu m) of natural gas annually.

Construction of natural gas pipelines will reach its peak in the next five years, said Yang, with the development of a national gas supply network.

Yang said the network will have domestically produced gas as its main source and imported gas as a backup, Yang said.

China's onshore natural gas production is mainly located in western regions. Offshore natural gas is mostly found in the East China Sea.

Imported gas is mostly transported via the China-Central Asia gas pipeline, which starts on the border between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, runs through Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, and ends at Horgos, a city in China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.

The pipeline will transport 30 billion cu m annually into China in the following 30 years, according to China National Petroleum Corp, the builder of the project.

Another major natural gas link is the Sino-Myanmar pipeline, which is currently under construction.

The 793-km pipeline will connect Kyaukphyu in Myanmar with Kunming in China's Yunnan province.

Construction of the line started in June and is due to be completed by the end of 2011. It will have a significant impact on the diversity of China's energy supply, said industry insiders.

The transportation capacity of the Sino-Myanmar natural gas line is expected to reach 12 billion cu m when it is completed.

China is also discussing the construction of a cross-border pipeline with Russia.

(China Daily October 20, 2010)