China signed a deal to purchase 3 million tonnes per year of Iran's Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) for a 25-year period, state television reported on Saturday. Malaysia's Petronas and France's Total SA hold the stakes of Iran's Pars LNG project. Total announced in September it will start development of Iran's South Pars LNG II project in 2011.
"Iran's National Gas Export Company (NIGEC) and China's Petro China signed a deal to purchase 3 million tonnes of LNG," state television said. "The price of the LNG will be calculated according to crude oil prices," state television quoted Nosratollah Seifi, the director of NIGEC as saying. "The executive phases of this project will begin early next year (beginning March 2007)," Seifi was quoted by the state television as saying.
Petro China is an affiliate of China's National Petroleum Company (CNPC). SHANA, Iranian oil ministry's official Web site, reported that the NIGEC-Petro China deal, signed on November 28, included exports of 3 million tonnes of LNG per year for a 25-year period.