China’s winter natural gas demand to rise 10% from year earlier

China’s demand for natural gas is expected to rise to 180 billion cubic meters (bcm) this winter, up 10 per cent from a year earlier, an official at PetroChina, the country’s top oil and gas producer, said on Thursday.

Petrochina has secured 106.2 bcm of gas supplies for this winter, up 8.4 per cent from a year ago, the official told a seminar organised by state-backed Chongqing Gas Exchange in Tianjin.

Li Wei, a vice director at PetroChina’s natural gas marketing company, the country’s largest natural gas wholesaler, said about 60 bcm of the natural gas would be supplied from domestic sources, while imported pipeline gas and liquefied natural gas (LNG)

would reach about 20 bcm and 10 bcm, respectively.

PetroChina plans to supply 82 bcm of natural gas for residential heating in cities and sell the rest to industrial sectors such as fertiliser and chemical.

“We expected that in general gas supply is able to meet the market demand this winter, but there could be tight supply in some peak periods,” said Li, adding that potential extreme was a major uncertainty.