India and Pakistan plan to finalize a $7-billion gas pipeline project from Iran to South Asia in December, which could be completed by 2010. They are also considering other pipelines from Turkmenistan, Qatar and from Myanmar to India. “With long-term gas demand from India and Pakistan estimated at 50 billion cum/yr, there is a need for more than one pipeline,” Dan Millison, a senior ADB energy specialist, said in a statement. The ADB said recently-released reserves information from Turkmenistan showed a lower-than-expected gas deliverability for the proposed $3.3-billion pipeline project to carry gas from Turkmenistan via Afghanistan to India and Pakistan.
“The reserves information shows that Turkmenistan could supply enough gas for the first few years but then production is predicted to decline instead of increasing,” said Millison. “They will need to find gas from other fields to meet pipeline design targets,” he said, adding that a third pipeline from Qatar or Oman could be needed.
Competing pipeline projects to South Asia have been on the drawing board since the early 1990s, with their likelihood improved by the recent thaw in India-Pakistan relations, and imports of more LNG are also being considered. The ADB has been brokering the 1,600-km Turkmenistan project since 2002, in an effort to link gas-rich Central Asia with energy-hungry South Asia. The project would give Turkmenistan a new outlet for its gas, and provide Afghanistan with transit revenues. It has been delayed, however, by concerns over security in Afghanistan and questions over the reserves in Turkmenistan’s Dauletabad gasfield. The ADB said Dauletabad had gross reserves of 1.4 trillion cum of gas, out of proven country reserves of about 2.0 trillion.
