Accelerated development of natural gas infrastructure

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Acceleration in the Construction of Natural Gas Infrastructure Author/Source: Date: 2018-03-22 Clicks: 105 The construction of natural gas infrastructure is progressing faster in various locations, including the development of gas storage facilities and LNG (liquefied natural gas) receiving stations. Analysts say that during this new golden age for natural gas infrastructure, companies involved in related equipment and engineering projects will benefit directly. As the facilities improve, consumption will grow steadily. Accelerating infrastructure construction: Reporters learned that Beijing Gas Group recently signed loan agreements for rural coal-to-gas conversion projects with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the China Clean Development Mechanism Fund Management Center. This is the first corporate loan issued by the AIIB since its establishment, and it will be used for projects in Beijing to build a gas distribution network that covers approximately 510 villages and serves around 216,750 households. The AIIB previously announced that the amount of this loan was 250 million dollars. CNPC plans to build 8 new gas storage facilities in Sichuan and Chongqing in three phases, with a total investment of over 21 billion yuan; the designed peak-shaving capacity of these facilities will exceed 21 billion cubic meters. To date, Sinopec’s LNG receiving stations have an annual handling capacity of 9 million tons. Sinopec will next advance the construction of the second and third phases of the Shandong LNG project, the second phase of the Tianjin LNG project, the Wenzhou LNG receiving station in Zhejiang, and the LNG receiving station in Jiangsu. From the end of 2017 to the beginning of this year, there was a shortage of natural gas supply in some areas in the north, leading to a significant short-term increase in LNG prices. The lack of infrastructure such as gas storage facilities has become a bottleneck restricting the use of natural gas, and there is increasing emphasis on expanding the construction of such infrastructure. In February 2018, the **Energy Bureau issued the \"Guiding Principles for Energy Work in 2018,\" which called for advancing the construction of natural gas pipelines in order to overcome bottlenecks related to the reverse transportation and transfer of gas from the south to the north ； Establish a natural gas reserve system, clarify the responsibilities and obligations of local people’s governments at the county level and above, gas supply companies, urban gas enterprises, and critical large-scale users in terms of gas storage for peak-shaving, and enhance the capacity for such storage and peak-shaving. Accelerate the expansion of existing gas storage facilities to reach their full capacity.