Construction has been completed on the China-Russia east-route natural gas pipeline, a vital energy corridor for China, and the facility is in its final commissioning phase, the National Oil and Gas Pipeline Network Group (PipeChina), the builder of the project, said on Nov. 18, as reported by CCTV.
Once fully operational, the pipeline will supply 38 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year to Northeast China, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, and the Yangtze River Delta. This will be sufficient to meet the annual needs of 130 million urban households, easing natural gas supply constraints in these regions, according to the CCTV report.
The pipeline spans 5,111 km, including 3,371 km of newly built sections. It starts in Heihe, Northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province, and extends to Shanghai.
According to the Russian energy giant Gazprom’s report, the supply of Russian natural gas to China surged by 43% year-on-year in the first half of this year, Sputnik news agency reported in September.