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”.