The eastern economic hub of Shanghai received its first deliveries of gas from China's newly opened East to West pipeline that runs some 4,000 kilometres (2,400 miles) from the Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region, state press reported Friday.
"What counts most is that the advent of gas symbolises the successful operation of the whole project," the Shanghai Daily quoted Zhao Yongxin, a PetroChina employee as saying.
The country's biggest oil firm, PetroChina, has financed the 4.0 to 5.2-billion-dollar pipeline expected to carry some 12 billion cubic metres (420 billion cubic feet) annually for some 30 years.
PetroChina's foreign partner's Royal Dutch/Shell Group, ExxonMobil and Russia's Gazprom withdrew from the project in September after an initial agreement fell apart.
The pipeline is central to China's energy policy shift away from reliance on coal to cleaner burning gas, which is intended to supply up to 10 percent of the country's fuel consumption by 2020.
China wants to reduce its reliance on coal and imported oil, trying to access more natural gas as part of efforts to shore up its energy supplies and clean up its filthy environment.
Xinjiang's Tarim Basin has estimated gas reserves of 8.4 trillion cubic metres, of which 658 billion cubic meters have been verified, according to state press.
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