China's southeast Guangdong Province would be fueled with 10 million cubic meters of natural gas after the second West-East natural gas pipeline complete by 2011, Xinhua reporter learned from a press conference in Guangzhou on Friday.

Construction began February 22 on the pipeline that will cross 14 Chinese regions, carrying 30 million cubic meters of natural gas from Turkmenistan to the economically prosperous, but energy-lacking eastern and southern Chinese areas, including Shanghai and Guangdong Province.

The pipeline, the second after China's first West-East natural gas pipeline, which began operation in 2004, is expected to play a significant role in improving China's energy consumption mode.

"The distributable gas is expected to be 26.1 million cubic meters per year after the operation of the pipeline and its stations consume some gas on the way. Guangdong Province will be provided 10 million cubic meters (of natural gas) annually," said Zhao Zhongxun, vice director of CNPC's planning department. CNPC is the sole investor in the project and the country's largest oil company.

The 9,102 km gas pipeline consists of one major line and eight sub-lines. Chen Xiangxin, vice manager of CNPC's pipeline construction project, said 1,594 km of the pipeline's western segment has been welded as of December 24. The length exceeds the original plan by 1.5 percent. The qualification rate of the welded pipeline reached 98.86 percent.

"According to the plan, the western segment will be able to convey gas by the end of 2009. and the eastern segment can supply gas to the area north of Henan province by 2010," said Chen.

Henan Province is located in the middle of China. with the Yellow River flowing across it.

The construction of the eastern segment of the pipeline started on December 11 and 12 at four sites in the provinces of Henan, Hubei, Jiangxi and Guangdong. Experts said the dense population, complex social environment and intricate terrain all pose challenges to the project.

(Xinhua News Agency December 27, 2008)