To guarantee China's sustained economic development and opening up western China an important meeting was called by the State Council alongside the State Development and Planning Commission and China Petroleum and Natural Gas Corporation to examine into the project "Move Gas East from Western China" on February 28.

A consensus reached by representatives attending the meeting was that "Move Gas East from Western China" will make most of Xinjiang's energy advantages in building up Xinjiang and a prosperous economy in the various areas, provinces and cities with the pipeline to be built.

According to plan, a gas pipeline over a distance of as many as 4200 kilometers will be built from Tarim, Xinjiang to Shanghai. With this pipeline constructed across Gansu, Ningxia, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Henan, Anhui and Jiangsu, an annual amount of 12 billion cube meters of natural gas will be moved east and used by areas in the eastern part of China during the early period after its putting into operation.

Construction items such as development and exploitation of petroleum and natural gas, construction of gas pipelines and some relevant items are also included in the project, with an early investment up to 120 billion yuan planned.