Russia pushes to revive western China gas route

With the ink still drying on a landmark gas trade contract, Russia is already pushing a second deal with China that would revive a proposal to build a pipeline from Russia's West Siberia gasfields into northwestern China, according to president Vladimir Putin's chief of staff Sergei Ivanov

"Considering the pace of China's economic growth and the agreed pricing formula I'd say it is very likely that we will soon conclude a contract to build a western [pipeline] before long," Ivanov was quoted saying in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk. The $400 billion gas deal signed in May will see state-run Gazprom develop the greenfield Kovyktinskoye and Chayandinskoye fields in remote East Siberia to supply 38bn cubic metres (cm) a year of gas to China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC). The companies will build a pipeline linking the fields to the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei commercial hub in northeast China. Gazprom has said it will spend $55bn developing the field and needed pipeline infra