TAIPEI (Bloomberg) -- China National Petroleum Corp. will start building in September oil and natural gas pipelines linking the nation and Myanmar, China Securities Journal reported, citing an unidentified official at the company.

The proposed $2 billion project will help transport petroleum from the Middle East and Africa to China and gas from the Southeast Asia country to Chinese users, the Securities Journal said on Monday.
Myanmar’s proven gas reserves jumped to 17.5 trillion cubic feet at the end of last year from 0.49 trillion cubic feet in 2007, according to the BP Statistical Review. That’s equivalent to a fifth of what Australia has. The pipelines will be able to transport 12 billion cubic meters of gas and 20 million metric tons of crude oil a year, the newspaper said.
China National Petroleum, the country’s biggest oil and gas producer, has oil and gas assets in Africa, Central Asia, South America, the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific region.