BEIJING: China has said it will allow private companies to invest in the country’s oil and gas storage sector, the government said in a document laying out changes it plans to make to the energy sector. In a document approved Sunday, the State Council said it plans to increase government investment in the country’s oil storage facilities while also allowing non-state firms to operate storage. It did not give further details. China’s new energy plan that acts on earlier promises to reform the country’s oil and gas industry was approved by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the State Council on Sunday, according to China’s Global Times.
Beijing has been trying to reform its oil and gas industry for some time as the country looks for ways to improve the efficiency of its monopolized sector amid lower oil prices. The CPC has introduced a number of measures including so-called mixed ownership of state firms and permitting smaller “teapot” refiners to import crude oil in the past. “This is the first time that China said it would encourage private capital in oil and gas storage facilities,” Lin Boqiang, a specialist in energy at Xiamen University, told Reuters. China has been working to expand its crude storage capacity over the past two years to capitalize on lower oil prices.
