HARBIN: Construction of the first Russia-China oil pipeline is going well and is expected to be completed by next year, said experts from both countries.

The pipeline will initially supply China 10 million tons annually. It will gradually increase to 30 million tons a year.

The feasibility of three more gas pipelines from Russia to China is also being discussed, said Li Guoyu, an expert with the China National Petroleum Corporation.

The three routes are:

Irkutsk to Daqing, with a projected annual gas capacity of 34 billion cu m.

Siberia to Lunnan, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, projected length 2,800 km and an annual gas capacity 30 billion cu m.

Sakhalin to China, with annual gas capacity of 15 billion cu m.

In 2005, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that his country would increase Russia's oil exports to Asia to 30 percent of all its oil exports by 2020.

Putin also said that an oil pipeline, starting from the Taishet, Irkutsk, to Nakhodka, Primorsky Krai, on the western bank of the Pacific Ocean, would be constructed.

The 4,000-km-long pipeline would pass through Skovorodino, Amursk, which is only 70 km from the China-Russia border.

And a sub-pipeline starting from Skovorodino would extend to Daqing, the most important oil production base in China.

The distance from Taishet to Skovorodino is 2,284 km, and Daqing is about 870 km from Skovorodino.

"I believe the Russian government will fulfil its commitment and finish the (700-km-long) pipeline in due time," Li said.

He said the 30 million tons of oil China will get from Russia would ease the energy strain.

China imported about 169 million tons of oil last year, 15 million tons were from Russia.

Last year, Russia produced 481 million tons of oil and 656.2 billion cu m of gas, making it the top producer.

Peter Ya Baklanov, director of the Pacific Geographical Institute of the Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said Russia plans to build an oil refinery at Kozmino Bay, near Nakhodka, the terminus of the oil pipeline.

The plant has a processing capacity of 20 million tons of crude oil, and about half will be sold to Japan, China and the Republic of Korea.

Source: China Daily