A Sept. 3 article in Bloomberg noted that the Power of Siberia 2 gas pipeline, announced during the SCO summit in Tianjin, Sept. 1, could displace existing U.S. LNG sales to China and disrupt U.S. plans for global energy hegemony, one of Trump’s claimed goals. The new pipeline and expansion of existing pipeline capacities could reduce China’s need for LNG by 40 million tons per year, which is half of its LNG imports last year, reported Bloomberg. This means that existing imports from the U.S., Qatar, and Australia might be replaced by Russian imports.
On top of that, the contracts Russia and China are signing will be cheaper than what is being supplied anywhere else. Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Sept. 4 during a press conference: “Of course, this [agreement] will create competitive advantages for our Chinese friends, because, I repeat, they will receive the product at balanced market prices, not at some inflated ones, as we are now observing in the Eurozone.”
