China races to beat gas supply crunch as big chill and Lunar New Year loom

The Chinese authorities have reinforced the gas supplies in sight of expected heating spike over the holidays, to avoid a repeat of December’s chaos, which saw serious supply shortages. To ensure supplies before the longest holiday in the Chinese calendar, some 60 ships carrying more than 4 million tonnes of LNG are on their way to China this month, the third highest total behind December’s 5.1 million and November’s 4.36 million tonnes. The shipments are coming from unusual origins, Equatorial Guinea and Angola in Africa, Peru in South America, and Trinidad and Tobago, and several are also coming from the United States. Domestic producers are also churning out more gas. China’s December gas output was the highest since at least 2014. The urgency for gas has lifted Chinese prices by 15-18 per cent within a week to 6,650 yuan (US$1,039.87) per tonne.