Chinese buyers are eying long-term supplies of liquefied natural gas from US company Cheniere Energy, an official from the firm said yesterday, in what would be the first LNG deal between the world's two biggest energy users.

Cheniere Energy is set to become the first US LNG exporter, with shipments to start by the end of 2015. But no Chinese firms have signed up for any US LNG cargoes yet.

That could change soon: "There's a lot of interest from Chinese buyers for long-term LNG volume, especially for 2020 onwards," said Nicolas Zanen, vice president for Asia at Cheniere Marketing Pte Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cheniere Energy Inc.

Zanen said some Chinese buyers had already begun moving to secure supplies, although without providing any details.

"The Chinese market is a very interesting market for us. I wouldn't be surprised if in the future we are delivering LNG to China. And not necessarily small buyers, big buyers as well," Zanen said on the sidelines of the Asia Oil and Gas Conference in Kuala Lumpur, declining to give more information.

Zanen made the comments following recent controversy in the US about American firms contracting to ship LNG supplies to China.

The US, which is seeing demand for new exports despite an emerging glut, is set to become the world's third-biggest exporter of LNG by 2020, behind Qatar and Australia.

Australia's LNG export capacity is set to more than triple to 86 million tons a year before 2020, compared with Qatar's annual 77 million tons and US hopes of selling 61.5 million tons per year by 2020.

Due to soaring output and cheaper oil, Asia's spot LNG prices have fallen by almost two-thirds since February of last year.

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