Asian natural gas pipeline proposed for easing energy, feedstock strains

Abstract

Nearly every country on the program at the recent Asian Natural Gas 5 Conference in Singapore reported on attempts to maximize the use of natural gas as a fuel and a feedstock. But no one made a more startling presentation than Masaru Hirata, chairman of the National Pipeline Research Society of Japan. His proposal: construct an international trunk pipeline network linking natural gas fields in Central Asia, Southeast Asia, Siberia, and North America with the main markets of Asia, primarily Japan and China. Total length -- 25,500 miles. He cites International Energy Agency data projecting a 70% increase in energy demand in the Pacific region between 1989 and 2000. Natural gas will be expected to satisfy anticipated energy needs into the next century. An important element in Hirata's thinking is the promotion of international cooperation among the beneficiaries of the network. In the Asia-Pacific region, natural gas is more plentiful than oil. Liquefied natural gas (LNG) plants have been built in Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Australia. All of them sell LNG to Japan (the world's largest importer of LNG), South Korea, and Taiwan. Additional vast reserves are known to exist in Siberia, near Sakhalin Island, and in the western regionsmore » of China. Hirata's network is aimed at bringing the gas from these distant deposits to consumers in the coastal regions of Asia. There are six major parts to the proposed network: Turkmenistan-West China-Japan; Yakutsk-China-Korea-Japan; Alaska-Sakhalin Island-Japan; ASEAN-South China; Within ASEAN; and Australia-ASEAN. The estimated cost of the project is about $66 billion in current dollars.« less