Pacific, Pertamina to bid for Taiwan's LNG contract

Pacific, Pertamina to bid for Taiwan's LNG contract

TAIPEI (Dow Jones): Taiwan's Pacific Construction Co. plans to
bid for the contract to supply natural gas to state-owned Taiwan
Power Co.'s Tatan Power Plant, an official at the construction
company told Dow Jones Newswires Thursday.

Indonesia's national oil company Pertamina would supply
liquefied natural gas to Pacific should Pacific win the contract,
which could be worth tens and billions of New Taiwan dollars,
according to the Pacific official.

Pacific also plans to build a LNG receiving terminal, the
official added.

Pacific has also been discussing with other foreign companies,
including BP PLC, for potential cooperation in the construction
company's planned natural gas business, the official added.

He declined to disclose details of these talks.

Taiwan Power, or Taipower, has set the deadline for the
submission of bids for the contract Aug. 16.

Taipower will buy natural gas from the successful bidder of
the tender for its planned 4,000-megawatt power plant in Tatan
for 25 years.

The deal, which will break national oil company Chinese
Petroleum Corp.'s monopoly in Taiwan's natural gas market, has
attracted interest from a number of international energy giants
as well as local companies.

Taiwan's Tung Ting Gas Corp. has been planning to compete for
the contract and has broken ground for its LNG terminal in
northern county of Taoyuan.

Tung Ting's shareholders include China Development Industrial
Bank, Uni-President Group, Evergreen Group, the Shinkong Group,
as well as Mitsubishi Corp., Itochu Corp., Kansai Electric Power
Co. and Osaka Gas Co. of Japan.

In addition, Taiwan's Far Eastern Group has said it plans to
cooperate with France's Total Fina Elf S.A. for the contract.

Royal Dutch/Shell Group officials had also said the company
was interested.