Russia to begin commercial oil supplies to China in 2011: official.

BEIJING, September 27 (Itar-Tass) - Russia will begin commercial oil
deliveries to China starting from January 1, 2011, and it does not rule
out that supplies will be doubled in the future, the head of the Russian
Transneft oil company, Nikolai Tokarev, said on Monday.
"The pumping of process oil in the pipeline, about 600,000 tons, will
begin in November-December. Commercial supplies will begin in January,"
the head of the company told reporters.
He reminded reporters that the contract envisages yearly supplies of
15 million tons of Russian oil to China. Tokarev did not specify the total
sum of the contract. "The oil price is changing constantly, the contract
has been signed for 20 years, but in any case it is a rather serious
amount," he said.
Tokarev explained that the ceremony to launch the Russian-Chinese
pipeline, in which Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Chinese President
Hu Jintao will take part, meant that the pipeline was in preparation for
operation.
He said the Mohe station is the first station on the Chinese bank of
the Amur River, from which the 1,000-kilometer-long ground section of the
pipeline will run to Daqing.
"Technologically it is possible to increase the amount to 30 million
tons, and we don't rule out that," Tokarev said.
-0-zhe/ast