Qatar has secured a second huge gas supply deal with a Chinese state-controlled company in less than a year, in a sign of the energy-hungry Asia power rushing to secure long-term agreements with one of the world’s top exporters of liquefied natural gas.
China National Petroleum Corporation and QatarEnergy signed a 27-year agreement on Tuesday, under which China will purchase 4mn tonnes of LNG a year from the Gulf state. CNPC will also take a 5 per cent equity stake in one of the LNG trains in Qatar’s expansion project in its North Field, the world’s biggest natural gas reservoir, as a joint venture partner.
The agreement comes just seven months after China’s Sinopec reached a similar 27-year deal with QatarEnergy, which at the time the Gulf state described as “the longest gas supply agreement in the history of the LNG industry”.
QatarEnergy has been courted by governments and energy companies across Europe and Asia as it pushes ahead with the $30bn expansion of…