China's Gas Demand Grows but Platts JKM Holds Near Lows as Domestic Supply Fills the Gap
China burned 3.1% more coal and gas in April while Platts JKM LNG front-month trades at $15.52, as domestic output and pipeline gas displace spot cargo demand.
Platts JKM LNG front-month traded at $15.52 per MMBtu on Monday (2026-06-29), holding near the 19-month lows it reached in the week of 11 May (2026-05-11), when OilPrice.com reported that additional supply arrivals and soft northeast Asian buying combined to push the benchmark lower.5 China's gas demand is growing — but domestic production growth and contracted pipeline volumes are preventing that demand from translating into spot purchasing.
China boosted its coal and gas power generation by 3.1% in April from a year earlier, according to data from the country's National Bureau of Statistics, as lower wind speeds and nuclear plant maintenance pushed utilities toward thermal generation.6 For the January-to-April period, thermal output rose 3.6% compared with the same stretch of 2025.6 Total power generation across the economy rose 2.6% in April year-on-year.6
The structural reason for the price disconnect is domestic gas supply growth. China's apparent gas consumption reached 4,260.5 billion cubic metres in 2024, a year-on-year increase of 8.0%, according to a National Energy Administration-linked research review; production reached 2,464 billion cubic metres, up 4.7%, marking the eighth consecutive year of production growth above 10 billion cubic metres.2 Domestic output is covering a rising share of consumption growth, reducing the structural pull on imported spot cargoes.
One emergent supply source is deep coalbed gas. China's National Energy Administration, highlighting its list of top 2024 exploration achievements, cited the rapid increase in deep coalbed gas production to 2.5 billion cubic metres over just three years, according to China's Economic Daily.3 The volumes are modest relative to total consumption but provide incremental supply at the margin, reducing the gap that spot LNG would otherwise need to fill.
Pipeline gas from Russia adds another offsetting layer. Exports via the Power of Siberia pipeline are projected to increase more than 20% this year compared with 2024, approaching the contracted maximum of 38 billion cubic metres annually, according to Bloomberg reporting on Russia's gas supply dynamics.1 That trajectory adds roughly 6 to 7 billion cubic metres of piped supply in 2025 relative to the prior year — a direct substitute for spot LNG cargoes at current economics.
Wood Mackenzie noted in a May (2026-05-21) analysis that China has become the world's largest LNG market, displacing Japan after decades of Japanese dominance — a shift driven by rising import terminal capacity and structural gas demand growth.4 But the size of China's appetite has not produced the spot price support the market might expect, precisely because domestic production and pipeline supply are absorbing a significant share of the incremental demand.
OilPrice.com reported in mid-May (2026-05-19) that spot demand from China remained soft even as the country holds the position of the world's largest or second-largest LNG buyer depending on measurement methodology.5 Traders cited additional supply as the concurrent factor. Combined LNG shipments into Japan, China, South Korea and Taiwan fell to about 15.94 million tonnes in February, down nearly 19% from the previous month, according to Refinitiv Eikon shipping data cited by Reuters.5
The convergence of factors — domestic gas production expanding year-over-year, Power of Siberia ramping toward capacity, and a China that is the market's largest demand centre but not its most active spot buyer — produces a surplus-skewed dynamic even as underlying energy demand grows. Platts JKM LNG front-month's path through the summer will depend substantially on how quickly European storage injection absorbs Atlantic Basin cargoes. A faster European draw would leave fewer cargoes available to Pacific markets and could provide the JKM floor that Chinese spot demand has so far declined to supply.5