China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) confirmed on October 23 that it has started receiving Kazakhstan’s first gas supplies to China, which crossed the border on October 13.

Earlier, Kazakhstan announced that it had launched gas exports to China with the transiting of gas from its Beineu-Bozoy-Shymkent pipeline to the Central Asia-China gas pipeline. Kazakh state-owned gas transit firm KazTransGas has agreed to supply 5bn cubic metres (cm) of gas to China’s PetroChina for about $1bn.

An agreement for the shipments was reached in June between Kazakh state-run KazMunaiGas and China’s CNPC - PetroChina is an arm of CNPC. The shipments will be carried out over the course of one year. The Kazakh gas was pumped via Line-C of the Central Asia-China gas pipeline, which has a capacity of 20bn cubic metres (cm) and is set to increase to 25bn cm in 2017.

“Historically, Kazakh gas used to be supplied to Europe through the Russian Federation and it is very important that now Kazakhstan has an alternative; five billion cubic metres of gas exported to China is just the beginning - the first step,” Bozumbayev was quoted as saying at the gas export launch ceremony. “We have the technical capability and throughput of gas pipelines to supply 10 billion cubic metres [per year]."

Line-C connects Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, allowing them to jointly supply gas to China. Once it reaches full capacity, the 1,300km-long pipeline will carry 10bn cm of gas from Turkmenistan, 10bn cm from Uzbekistan and 5bn cm from Kazakhstan.

Shipments via Line-C have reached 194.5bn cm metres of gas to date - mostly from Turkmenistan. Uzbekistan has also contributed to these volumes.

The route will help Kazakhstan diversify its gas exports. The link will also strengthen China’s grip on Central Asian gas reserves and challenge Russia’s status as the main recipient of Kazakh gas.