S'pore to buy RI gas

S'pore to buy RI gas

SINGAPORE (AFP): Singapore is discussing buying natural gas from Indonesia's petroleum giant Pertamina to drive power stations and homes, the local Business Times daily said yesterday.

The power-guzzling city-state at presents imports gas via a pipeline from neighboring Malaysia.

A spokesman for the trade and industry ministry official said talks with Pertamina were "on-going" and that they revolved around supplies from the Natuna fields in the South China Sea.

Work on the mammoth US$42-billion Natuna project, to be jointly developed by Pertamina and US oil giant Exxon, is scheduled to start in January 1997, with the first gas shipments expected by 2003.

But marketing of the gas is already underway, with Pertamina trying to line up customers, like Thailand and Singapore.

Singapore, whose electricity generation is mostly fueled by oil, imports some 150 million cubic feet of natural gas daily via a pipeline from Malaysia's northern Trengganu state under a 15- year contract expiring in 2007.