Turkey's Energy and Natural Resources Minister, Taner Yıldız, and China's Deputy Minister for Trade, Wang Zhiyuan, have signed a MoU for the construction of a gas storage plant near Lake Tuz, in central Anatolia . The new plant will be the largest in the country, and, once fully operational, will bring the overall capacity of Turkey's storage facilities to 3.6 billion cubic metres, hence 10% of the country's requirements. The storage plant will consist of twelve different caverns built at a depth of between 1,100 and 1,400 metres. According to Yıldız, the country needs at least another five or six plants of this kind. Turkey is now linked to Iran with a "pay or buy" agreement obliging Ankara to pay the equivalent of 6.8 billion cubic metres of gas a year.