Coming soon to a terminal near you

摘要

Along the coast of China, six vast lique-fied natural gas (lng) terminals are under construction; by the end of 2015 they should have more than doubled the amount of lng that the country can import. At the other end of the country, gas is flowing in along a new pipeline from Turkmenistan. In between the two, geologists and engineers are looking at all sorts of new wells that might boost the country's already fast-growing domestic production. China will consume 260 billion cubic metres (26obcm, which is 9.2 trillion cubic feet) of gas a year by 2015, according to the country's 12th five-year plan, more than tripling 2008's 8ibcm. The roots of this rapid growth, though, do not lie in China's centralised planning. They are to be found in a piece of deregulation enacted decades ago on the other side of the world: America's Natural Gas Policy Act of 1978.