China increases gas imports from Turkmenistan for green energy transition. It's impact is unclear

Will China replacing coal with natural gas help the climate?

Originally published on Global Voices

China is the biggest energy consumer and importer in the world. Oil, gas and coal imports to China account for around 85 percent, 40 percent and 7 percent of the country’s domestic consumption, respectively; and about 18 percent, 16 percent and 18 percent of the global trade of these commodities.

China’s economy and energy industries were and still are heavily reliant on coal, which is posing environmental and health risks both at home and abroad. In order to reduce the country’s dependency on coal, the State Council of China announced an action plan for air pollution prevention and control and proposed to move to “coal-to-gas/electricity projects” in 2013.

Although China is developing its domestic gas and oil production, it is still heavily dependent on foreign gas exports. In 2021 its dependency on foreign gas reached 44.37 percent.

China’s main natural gas suppliers are Australia Russia, Qatar and Turkmenistan, with Turkmenistan supplying more than half of its pipeline gas imports. 

Turkmenistan increases gas supplies to China

In 2022, Turkmenistan exported 35 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas to China and overtook Russia which is now China’s second-largest gas exporter at 10 bcm per year. This increase comes even as China pays 30 percent more for Turkmen gas than for Russian gas. Reuters news agency quoted industry insiders claiming that China has failed to negotiate less cost for Turkmen gas because the Turkmen government insist on staying “in line with global pricing practices”. 

China imports pipeline gas as well as liquefied natural gas (LNG).  The difference between the two is once a pipeline is built it stays in place, whereas LNG is transported via transport tankers. In 2022, pipeline gas import accounted for 42 percent of China's total gas import. 

Turkmenistan supplies gas to China via the 1,833-kilometer-long Central Asia-China pipeline system. It consists of three pipelines running parallel to each other, A, B, and C and the fourth one, pipeline D is currently under construction, indicating that China is and will continue to prioritize gas exports from Central Asia over Russian gas. Reuters news agency quoted a Chinese state oil official saying, “Central Asian pipelines are considered a cornerstone investment in China's energy and geopolitical space. It's a supply channel with a strategic value that supersedes commercial concerns.” 

Turkmenistan plays a key role in China’s Central Asian gas supplies and relations between the two countries are crucial for both.

In 2009, China signed a gas deal with Turkmenistan, where Turkmenistan committed to increasing its gas exports to China by 30 percent each year.  According to the report published by the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, “China has now replaced exports to Russia as the mainstay of Turkmenistan’s gas business, and of its export revenues.” Turkmenistan is considered a high-risk country for international investors due to the government’s total control of the economy, corruption and weak regulatory legislation. At the same time, the Turkmen government doesn’t seem willing to change the current state of affairs, with one Oxford Energy report noting, “Turkmenistan now relies on two foreign companies — Chinese National Petroleum Corporation and Petronas — for more than one-quarter of its gas output”.

Turkmenistan’s export revenues and overall economy depend significantly on its gas exports to China.  In 2022, Turkmenistan exported USD 12.5 billion worth of goods, with USD 10.3 billion of that being gas exports to China — a staggering 82 percent of their total exports. 

Methane leaks in Turkmenistan

For China, buying gas from Turkmenistan not only diversifies its energy sources but also supports its effort to reduce carbon emissions. Natural gas is less carbon-intensive than coal, and transitioning from coal to natural gas in power plants and factories can cut CO2 emissions by nearly half. 

However, this doesn't come without risk. Turkmenistan is home to some of the world's most serious methane leakage incidents. In 2021, the Paris-based International Energy Agency found Turkmenistan responsible for a third of large emission events around the globe. According to energy experts, methane leaks from the country’s two main fossil fuel fields caused more global heating in 2022 than the entire carbon emissions of the United Kingdom. The climate advantage of natural gas may be negated as Turkmenistan struggles to contain the leaks. 

Methane leaks in Turkmenistan are believed to come from ageing and poorly maintained oil and gas pipelines and from the venting to the atmosphere of unwanted methane gas that is produced alongside oil. However, Turkmenistan remains one of the most closed countries in the world, and it is impossible to independently verify if work to combat methane leakage has started yet.

The importance of methane as a greenhouse gas has become much better understood in recent years, and today it is estimated that methane emissions are responsible for as much as 25 percent of greenhouse gas emissions today. Methane leaks are therefore a major threat to the fight against climate change and the natural disasters that it will bring. There is a growing global focus on addressing methane leaks from fossil fuel production sites and pipelines, which is seen as perhaps the fastest, simplest and cheapest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions.

During the 2021 COP26 global climate meeting in Glasgow, Turkmenistan’s president Serdar Berdimukhammedov pledged that his country would introduce modern technologies to tackle methane leaks. He later adopted a roadmap to implement these actions. 

Local environmentalists in Turkmenistan who spoke on a condition of anonymity are sceptical about the commitment of the Turkmenistan leadership to reducing methane leaks. 

At the same time, Beijing’s reliance on Turkmenistan for natural gas is increasing, as the world’s second-largest economy seeks new energy sources to fuel its development ambitions. While Chinese newspapers and research institutions have acknowledged the severity of the gas leaks in Turkmenistan, the government has yet to publicly address the issue in negotiations. Last year in May, Chinese leader Xi Jinping unveiled a grand strategy to coordinate Central Asia's development. In addition to infrastructure and trade, Xi said that the construction of a fourth natural gas pipeline should be accelerated. 

The push to secure stable and substantial natural gas supplies from Turkmenistan is a critical step in China's energy transition strategy, as China pivots away from coal to cleaner energy sources to meet its ambitious climate goals.  

In 2020, Chinese President Xi Jinping committed to reaching net zero in greenhouse gas emissions by 2060. Since then, China has expanded its solar and wind energy capacities, as well as nuclear and hydroelectric power. Aside from the push into renewable sources, China is phasing out the construction of coal-fired power plants and filling energy demands with natural gas, which serves as a more immediate, albeit transitional, lower-carbon alternative. China’s National Development and Reform Commission, the agency responsible for the country’s macroeconomic plans, has pledged to boost the use of natural gas to 7 percent of total primary energy consumption by 2030. In August, Chinese leader Xi Jinping called to enhance the comprehensive strategic partnership between China and Turkmenistan, a sign of Turkmenistan’s crucial role in helping China achieve its own environmental objectives. 

China’s energy transition has begun and is driving a major expansion of solar and wind energy, along with nuclear power and hydroelectricity plants. However coal use in China is still growing, and any serious progress toward net zero will require it to stop building coal-fired power plants and replace them in many cases with natural gas plants or green energy alternatives. 

Replacing coal with natural gas is one of the ways China is striving to meet its climate commitments, but to the extent this gas comes from Turkmenistan, the climate benefit is highly questionable.

Written by GV Climate Project, shahidayakub