OVADAN DEPE: Turkmenistan on Friday opened a $1.7 billion gas-to-liquids plant as it seeks to monetise vast but idle gas reserves amid an economic crunch.

The isolated Central Asian country holds the world’s fourth-largest natural gas reserves and has in recent years sought to diversify an economy battered by low energy prices.

The plant opened in the desert town of Ovadan-Depe outside the capital Ashgabat with Japanese and Turkish investment is the largest gas-to-liquids plant in Central Asia.

Published in Dawn, June 29th, 2019