Europe’s energy supply sector is facing an exciting future.
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Natural gas and gas infrastructure will play a central role in this new era. Gas storage facilities will have a particularly important part to play, owing to the demand for flexibility created by diverse and volatile energy sources and increased reliance on energy trading.
This business will also focus on the sustainable use of natural gas infrastructure. New technologies such as “power to gas” enable converting surplus wind and solar energy into hydrogen or methane, thereby producing renewable green gas. This means that in future our storage facilities will hold not just natural gas but also hydrogen. The company’s name “RAG Energy Storage” has been chosen with an eye to this wider role of underground gas storage facilities as a means of storing energy from a variety of sources.
Good reasons for gas
There is no way of saving up wind and sunlight, but natural gas certainly can be stored. As a result it can be used to even out the unavoidable fluctuations in re¬newable energy output. This applies to homes, where natural gas heats the water when the sun goes in. And it goes for public power supplies. The wide swings in renewable electricity feed-in to the grid call for complementary technologies that respond quickly and flexibly to supply shortfalls. In short, natural gas is opening the way for the renewable energy age. It is the natural partner for renewables.
Modern domestic condensing boilers have efficiencies as high as 98%. And natural gas is also an excellent fuel for power generation. Combined cycle gas and steam turbine generating stations are among the most efficient conventional power plants. In combined heat and power configurations they deliver efficiencies of 90%.
Natural gas plays a key role in Austrian and European energy supply security. Austria’s gas comes from domestic production and imports under long-term contracts with reliable partners. Austria has a well developed pipeline grid, and due to its geographical location it is linked to the rest of the European grid by large transit systems.
Global developments, geopolitical tensions, and increasing volatility on the energy markets are posing major challenges to our energy supply. The transformation towards a climate-neutral energy system is essential – but it will take time. Today, natural gas is a guarantor of supply security, and it will remain a key pillar of a stable energy supply in the future. Because the need is not only for clean energy, but also for the highest possible level of supply security – for businesses and households alike. The sources of natural gas supply to Austria and Central Europe have changed significantly. As a result, new flexibility requirements have emerged for RAG in its role as a technical storage operator – to ensure that gas handling and quality assurance continue to meet the highest standards. These challenges have been successfully met through great effort, and maintaining these standards will remain a priority going forward.
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Products and services
RAG Energy Storage offers highly flexible storage services that can be used both for conventional supplies to consumers, and for intraday and structured transactions.
Our approach generates extra value added for our customers. Physical storage capacity can also be used to hedge against unpredictable balancing energy and structured supply contract costs.
We see service providers and their customers as a team. Besides providing storage services, RAG Energy Storage gives its customers the benefit of its outstanding expertise in all areas of the gas industry.
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Gas storage facilities – the energy storage solution of the future
Energy storage is central to Europe’s supply security. The vast quantities of energy that can be held in storage facilities converted from depleted gas reservoirs and their unparalleled flexibility make them a mainstay of the energy supply mix.
The construction and operation of underground storage facilities calls for highly specialised knowledge, extensive experience and state-of-the-art technology. Our parent company, RAG Austria AG, is the technical operator of the RAG storage. It has the expertise to make the most of the potential of former gas reservoirs – safely and efficiently.
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Storage of gaseous energy sources
Because of their outstanding characteristics, underground storage facilities are suitable not just for storing natural gas, but also for stockpiling of hydrogen, bio methane and synthetic gas. Surplus electricity can be used to produce hydrogen. This makes the excess power storable. No comparable form of storage is available to the wholesale electricity market at present, as such capacity is regarded as a part of the generation function and cannot be booked by third parties on open markets. Gas storage will take on an ever more important role in storing energy because volatile wind and solar power generation is resulting in large supply overhangs and shortages. Currently, there are no comparable electricity storage systems available on the wholesale energy market, as such systems are typically regarded solely as part of the generation process and cannot be accessed or booked by third parties on the market. Own project aimed at realising this promising technology and making this form of energy storage accessible for the market are already under way.