Austria's Haidach Links to 2nd German Network
Austrian underground gas storage facility Haidach, operational since 2007, has now been connected to a second German gas transmission system.
The facility’s operator Astora, the German storage subsidiary of Russia’s Gazprom, said December 17 that it has connected Haidach to Germany’s Open Grid Europe (OGE) gas system, enabling customers at Haidach since mid-December to book capacity linking Haidach to/from OGE’s Haiming III network connection point.
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Since 2007 Haidach has been connected to the regional Bayernets gas system of southern Germany at Burghausen/Haiming, which also connects to the Austrian gas system.
The OGE and Bayernets systems are both part of Germany’s NCG market area, so the second connection will improve Haidach’s access to the German gas market.
Haidach’s working gas storage capacity was doubled to 2.78bn m3 in 2011; the facility is jointly owned by Gazprom and Austrian oil and gas producer RAG, and is the second largest storage facility in central Europe.
Germany’s two market areas, NCG and Gaspool, are to be combined into one in October 2021, according to plans agreed this July between gas grid operators and their regulator. This will improve access between Haidach and the German gas grid, Gascade, the latter 50-50% owned by Gazprom and BASF-Wintershall, as Gascade is part of the Gaspool area.
Additional option
Astora also said December 17 that, starting 2020, it will additionally offer transport capacities to inject and offtake gas in the Haidach dependent on air temperature. Thus storage customers at Haidach will then be able to book 100% of the transport capacity for the withdrawal at winter temperatures of 0o Celsius or colder.