{"id":1454851,"date":"2026-10-20T10:41:50","date_gmt":"2026-10-20T07:41:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/?p=1454851"},"modified":"2026-10-20T10:41:50","modified_gmt":"2026-10-20T07:41:50","slug":"gas-at-half-price-russia-sells-fuel-to-china-at-a-record-discount","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/gas-at-half-price-russia-sells-fuel-to-china-at-a-record-discount\/","title":{"rendered":"Gas at half price: Russia sells fuel to China at a record discount"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2026, the discount on Russian gas supplied to China via the Power of Siberia pipeline will reach a record level. Beijing will buy the fuel much cheaper than other foreign customers of Gazprom.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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This is reported by<\/a> The Moscow Times.<\/p>\n

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What price was set for China?<\/h2>\n

The average cost of a thousand cubic meters of Russian gas for China this year will be $247.9. For other foreign buyers, the price will reach $562 for the same volume.<\/p>\n

Thus, the difference will be about $315 per thousand cubic meters, and the discount for Beijing is about 56%.<\/p>\n

For comparison, last year China paid an average of $240.3 per thousand cubic meters for Russian gas, while for other foreign customers of Gazprom the price was $406.5. Accordingly, the gap in the cost of gas for the Chinese market and other buyers will increase by about 15 percentage points.<\/p>\n

The Russian government plans to maintain a significant price advantage over China in the coming years. In 2027, a thousand cubic meters of gas for Beijing is projected to cost $251.3, compared to $450 for other foreign buyers.<\/p>\n

In 2028, the price for China is expected to be $247.8, while for other foreign customers it is $361.9. This would correspond to a discount of approximately 32%.<\/p>\n

In 2029, Russian gas could cost Beijing $246.4 per thousand cubic meters, compared to $323.2 for other buyers. In this case, the difference would be about 24%.<\/p>\n

Russia sells gas to China cheaper than Turkmenistan<\/h2>\n

Despite significant concessions, Russian fuel costs China less than gas from some other sources. In particular, Beijing pays $40-60 more per thousand cubic meters for Turkmen gas than for Russian gas.<\/p>\n

Analysts made such calculations based on data from Chinese customs. At the same time, Turkmen gas travels a greater distance to the main consumption centers in China than fuel coming from Russia.<\/p>\n

In 2025, Russia exported 39.4 billion cubic meters of gas to China via the Power of Siberia pipeline. In 2026, supplies could increase to 40.5 billion cubic meters.<\/p>\n

However, the Chinese market compensates Gazprom for only about a fifth of its former supplies to the European Union. Before losing a significant part of the European market, the Russian gas giant exported almost 200 billion cubic meters there per year.<\/p>\n

After the start of a full-scale war against Ukraine, Gazprom lost approximately two-thirds of its exports.<\/p>\n

China is in no hurry to approve a new gas pipeline<\/h2>\n

Negotiations on the construction of a new gas pipeline to China, previously called “Power of Siberia-2” and later promoted in Russia under the name “Power of Baikal”, have effectively reached a dead end.<\/p>\n

Beijing insists on a much lower price \u2014 from $50 to $150 per thousand cubic meters. This price level is close to domestic Russian gas prices for the population.<\/p>\n

Moscow, on the other hand, is keen to maintain the current pricing formula. Disagreements between the parties are hindering progress on a project that would help Russia compensate for the loss of the European market.<\/p>\n

In December 2025, Lu Ruquan, president of the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), said that the project would require a significant amount of work and lengthy negotiations. He estimated that construction could take 8\u201310 years.<\/p>\n

At the same time, in September 2025, Gazprom announced the signing of a legally binding agreement to build the Power of Siberia-2 through Mongolia and expand supplies via other routes.<\/p>\n

Once completed, the new pipeline is expected to transport up to 50 billion cubic meters of gas to China per year for 30 years. At the same time, the price of fuel for the Chinese market is expected to be lower than for the European market.<\/p>\n

Beijing opts for limited expansion of existing supplies<\/h2>\n

China is wary of increasing its dependence on a single supplier, especially as demand for gas slows, and negotiations over the new route have repeatedly stalled.<\/p>\n

Back in August 2025, the parties failed to reach an agreement on Power of Siberia 2. Instead, China considered offering Russia to increase the capacity of the already existing Power of Siberia 1 gas pipeline by 6 billion cubic meters per year.<\/p>\n

However, such expansion cannot compensate for the loss of a significant part of the European market.<\/p>\n

Russia has also previously offered Mongolia cheap gas in exchange for facilitating the implementation of a new gas pipeline project to China. However, in 2024, Mongolia did not include the Power of Siberia-2 in its national development plan for the next five years.<\/p>\n

Thus, despite Moscow’s plans to increase exports to China, Beijing is in no hurry to agree to a large-scale infrastructure project and at the same time gets the opportunity to purchase Russian gas on favorable terms.<\/p>\n

It was previously reported that during a visit to Beijing, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin was unable to obtain support from Chinese leader Xi Jinping for the construction of the Power of Siberia-2 gas pipeline.<\/a><\/p>\n

Also follow \u201cPryamim\u201d<\/strong> on Facebook<\/a> , X<\/a> , Telegram<\/a> , and Instagram.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 2026, the discount on Russian gas supplied to China via the Power of Siberia pipeline will reach a record level. Beijing will buy the fuel much cheaper than other foreign customers of Gazprom. This is reported by The Moscow Times. What price was set for China? The average cost of a thousand cubic meters […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":1398523,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[76871,76872,76875,76885],"class_list":["post-1454851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-2","category-news-feed","category-other-news","category-policy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1454851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/35"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1454851"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1454851\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1454852,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1454851\/revisions\/1454852"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1398523"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1454851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1454851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}