If the Great Wall that runs from east to west, winding up high
mountains and lofty hills and the plateau desert is said to
resemble a flying dragon, then, the west-to-east gas pipeline, that
leads from west to east, runs through deserts, crosses Taihang
Mountains and gets across the Yellow and Yangtze rivers, meandering
8,000 li (4,000 km) and brings benefits to hundreds of millions of
people, is a magic hidden dragon.
This 4,000-km-long main energy artery that runs through the
heartland of China starts west from Lunnan of the Mongolian
Autonomous Prefecture of Beyinguoleng in Xinjiang, via Gansu and
Ningxia into Shaanxi and, in Jingbian of Shaanxi, connects with the
Changqing Gas-field and then gets across the Yellow River through
Shanxi, Henan, Anhui, Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces to reach
Shanghai in the east, pipelining the rich reserves of natural gas
in the Tarim Basin unceasingly to China's economically most
developed southeast coastal regions.
The west-to-east gas pipelining project is the largest scheme
started up in the beginning of the new century in China: investment
of 27.3 billion yuan has been made for the prospecting and
development of the upstream gas-field and 43.5 billion yuan for
pipeline construction, investment of 68.8 billion yuan has been
channeled to the downstream gas-using project as well as to the
construction of urban pipe network, the scale of investment is in
no way inferior to that of the Three Gorges Project, it will play a
tremendous role in boosting the development of the western region.
For this reason, after the Party Central Committee and the State
Council formally announced the start of the west-to-east
gas-pipelining project in March 2000, Premier Zhu Rongji called it
as "the curtain has been raised for the large-scale development of
the western region". More than two years have passed, after the
overture has been sounded, what magnificent drama will be
staged?
A
Best "Win Win" Choice for the East and West
People compare the west-to-east gas pipelining project to a golden
bridge featuring "win-win" for the east and west, erected between
the western region with superior resources and the vast market of
the eastern region. Indeed, the west-to-east gas pipelining project
converts the resources advantage of the western region into real
economic benefits, the western region is the greatest
beneficiary.
Input into the development of Xinjiang's gas-fields can bring
Xinjiang an additional financial revenue of over 1 billion yuan,
the areas along the western region outside Xinjiang will also
receive no small benefits. The 4,000-km-long west-to-east gas
pipelining project involves an investment of 43.5 billion yuan, 67
percent of which will be used in the construction of the western
region.
So, this project playing a major stimulating role is regarded as a
very rare opportunity by the western region and an indicative
project marking the large-scale development of the western
region.
The destination of this project is the richest Yangtze River Delta.
The eastern region is poor in resources. This region relies on 85
percent of resources transferred in from other regions. A survey
shows that in the coming decade the demand for natural gas here
will increase from this year's over 2 billion cubic meters to over
20 billion cubic meters by a colossal 10 fold by the year 2010!This
represents a vast market space for the development of China's
natural gas industry.
After this project is put into use, a planned annual volume of over
2 billion cubic meters will be carried down along the line to
supply the Yangtze Delta for its 10 billion cubic meter plan, this
12 billion cubic meters of natural gas mean a substitute of
9-million-ton standard coal and the reduction in the discharge of
270,000 tons of smoke dust.
For this, Minister of the State Development Planning Commission
Zeng Peiyan points out this is a project of important strategic
significance. It will bring benefits not only to various ethnic
groups of Xinjiang, and to people in various provinces, autonomous
regions and municipalities along the line, but will also help
improve China's energy composition and reduce atmospheric
pollution, so it is a most realistic choice for China's sustainable
development.
"The west-to-east gas pipelining also represents a major strategic
move in structural readjustment of China's energy industry", said
Ma Fucai, general manager of the China National Petroleum Group
Company. China's net import of oil came to 60 million tons last
year, domestic petroleum output has failed to meet the demand for
national economic development, China's natural gas resources output
has exceeded 38,000 billion cubic meters, the prospect for
large-scale development is promising, making it possible "to
supplement oil with gas". Currently, the proportion of natural gas
in China's primary energy structure is very low, less than 3
percent, whereas the world's average level has reached 23
percent.
Ma
Fucai pointed out that in order to improve the energy structure and
the human living environment, many countries have gone through the
process of fine-quality energy conversion from
coal-petroleum-natural gas. The west-to-east gas pipelining project
will help accelerate the realization of this change. . He indicated
that he would seize this opportunity to quicken pace of the
optimization of China's energy industrial structure and the
upgrading of industry, striving to raise the proportion of natural
gas in China's energy consumption structure to about 8 percent in
about 10 years' time.
Keep the Resources Market under Control
Unless one has been to Xinjiang, one will not know the size of
China. Xinjiang covers one/fifth area of the vast expanse of China,
an area abounds in natural gas resources. The Tarim Basin lying
between Tianshan and Kunlun Mountains has a volume of natural gas
resources reaching 8390 billion cubic meters, representing 28
percent of the country's terrestrial natural gas resources volume.
The "main force" of this project is the Tarim Basin.
If
the key to the success or failure of the project is resource, then,
the core is the market. When the feasibility studies report was
made two years ago, what was most questioned was the market
question, nowadays, this biggest question mark has been
straightened out. Currently, the China National Petroleum
Corporation has signed a letter of intent on buying and selling as
well as on pipelining with 45 gas-using enterprises in four
provinces-Henan, Anhui, Zhejiang and Jiangsu and one municipality
of Shanghai. The planned volume of gas use is 12 billion cubic
meters in 2005 and 16.6 billion cubic meters in 2007. General
Manager Huang Weihe with the West-to-East Gas Pipelining Sub-branch
of China National Petroleum and Natural Gas Co. Ltd. disclosed to
us, it has been planned that after the conclusion of the
first-phased project, 10 compressor stations will be added to the
second-phased project, so as to enlarge the transfer volume and
finally realize the annual transfer volume of 18 billion cubic
meters.
The Pipe-work Has Been Started Up Smoothly
The world's first pipeline was laid in 1872, while China's first
pipeline was built in 1970, lagging behind for 100 full years.
However, construction of the west-to-east pipelining project will
raise China's pipeline construction level to the world first rate
at one stroke: Completely automatic control will be realized for
the 4,000 km pipeline, about one person for every 10 km on
average.
Experts say the diameter of the gas pipeline is 1016 mm, and the
grade of pressure is 10 mega-Pascal, the selection of tubular
product is X70 steel, single pipe-laying is 4,000 km, the project
runs across China, it has to run through desert, Gobi, loess
plateau and across the three major water systems of the Yangtze,
Yellow and Huaihe rivers and gets through the seismic breaking belt
and high-intensity seismic active region, the degree of
difficulties is rarely seen in the world.
This is the first time that China undertakes the construction of
such a gigantic gas pipelining project, can it be completed on time
in 2005?
"China National Petroleum Corporation is not only fully capable of
completing the project as scheduled, but also is sure to complete
it ahead of time", said General Manager Ma Fucai confidently.
It
is reported that currently China has built 12,000 km of land gas
pipelines which were all designed and constructed by China itself,
the Sebei-Xining-Lanzhou peipeline just completed at the end of
last year is a successful testing ground for the project and a lot
of valuable experiences have been accumulated. For instance, the
adoption of semi-automatic and automatic welding under freezing and
high-heat belts as well as the bad external environment; for
instance the trial use of 11.2 km home-made X70 steel for the first
time, etc.
The pipelining team is strong and well-trained. At present, the
China National Petroleum and Natural Gas Group Company alone
possesses four professional pipelining teams, two professional
design institutes, more than 9,000 builders; there are also a
number of oil construction teams. It is due to a well-thought-out
plan beforehand that the 4,000-km pipeline can be completed in a
little over two years.
The central government has decided that the west-to-east gas
pipelining project includes the construction and management of
pipelines and the construction and transformation of urban pipe
networks, the whole line is open to the outside world and all-round
cooperation with foreign countries is introduced, this opening
strategy has provided a solid guarantee for the smooth
implementation of this project. The west-to-east gas pipelining
project is China's largest joint venture with foreign companies
undertaken since the launch of China's reform and opening-up
policy, which is greatly favored by foreign investors. The
investment group jointly formed by several companies including the
strongest Shell and Exxon corporations in the international
petroleum circles has begun to get itself involved in it.
On
February 5 this year, the five experimental projects in the
river-passing-through section with a fairly long period of
construction in this project and in the river networking section
south of the Yangtze River were the first to start construction.
General Manager Huang Weihe told us that construction of the 265-km
river networking section is the most difficult, currently it is
progressing smoothly and is expected to be all completed by the end
of this year; the passing-through section of the Huaihe River has
been finished without a hitch.
Speaking about the progress of the pipelining project, the General
Manager said that the entire project is to be constructed in two
stages: the Lunnan-Jingbian section and the Jingbian-Shanghai
section. On January 1, 2004, the 1537-km Jingbian-Shanghai section
will be put through, the natural gas of Changqing gas-field will be
transferred first; after the whole line is through in 2005, gas
from Tarim will begin to be transferred.
The overture for the large-scale development of the western region
has been sounded, and the curtain for the construction of the
project has been raised, we seem like being able to see a new
economic belt-an economic belt, that radiates wider and exerts
deeper influence than the Yangtze Economic Belt and the Yellow
Economic Belt, is rising majestically on the vast land of
China.
(People's Daily July 5, 2002)