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The UK’s gas storage capacity could increase by 30%, as the
Government today issued the first licence under a new regime to
encourage the construction of more gas storage.
The Gateway Project, located in the east Irish Sea, would create
twenty new salt caverns each the size of the Albert Hall.
Energy and Climate Change Minister Lord Hunt said:
"The successful performance of the UK’s gas system, even
during the severely cold weather seen this winter, shows that we
have one of the most resilient gas systems in the world.
"But we do want to encourage more gas storage capacity,
like Gateway, to provide flexibility in the future at times of
high demand.
"This shows the Energy Act 2008 is proving its worth by
enabling the Government to license an important new gas storage project."
Chairman of Gateway Storage Company George Grant said:
"The support and encouragement given by DECC to bring
the Gateway Storage project forward through the new consenting
process has been invaluable, as was the Crown Estate’s agreement
of the offshore site licence.
"We are now fully engaged with the project’s engineering
design and are targeting 2014 for the start of commercial storage operations."
The Crown Estate, which has already agreed and issued the lease
for the Gateway project, welcomed the decision.
Notes to Editors
1. As North Sea oil and gas supplies decline, there is a greater
need for gas import capacity and storage.
2. Since 2006 there has been a sharp increase in our gas supply
capacity, including the opening of the Langeled pipeline
connecting the UK to Norway, the BBL pipeline connecting the UK to
the Netherlands, as well as LNG import terminals at the Isle of
Grain, Teesside, and Milford Haven (the South Hook and Dragon
terminals). The LNG terminals have enabled Liquefied Natural Gas
to be imported from global markets, including such countries as
Algeria and Qatar.
3. The UK’s gas import capacity is now about 125% of our annual
gas consumption, which represents a 500% increase during the last
10 years.
4. Gas storage helps the UK’s gas market to meet seasonal and
short-term peaks in demand, and to respond to price volatility. In
recent years, Centrica’s Rough field has been the UK’s only
offshore gas storage facility and our largest single facility, but
a number of new projects are now coming forward, both onshore and
offshore.
5. The Energy Act 2008 created a regulatory framework, in which
Crown Estate controls the exclusive rights to use geological
structures beneath the seabed for gas storage, and DECC operates a
licensing system that allows us to regulate storage for
environmental and other purposes.
6. Gateway Storage Company Limited is the name of the licensee of
the project, in which a number of salt caverns would be created
below the Irish Sea to store 1.5 billion standard cubic meters of gas.
7. Gateway would be built in salt caverns approximately 750m
beneath the surface of the seabed and located 15 miles offshore,
south west of Barrow-in-Furness. The Gateway company propose to
connect the facility to the National Gas Transmission System (NTS)
via a new pipeline to a gas compression station adjacent to the
existing Morecambe gas terminals at Barrow.
8. The Department of Energy and Climate Change is central to the
UK Government’s leadership on climate change. We are pushing hard
internationally for ambitious effective and fair action to avert
the most dangerous impacts. Through our UK Low Carbon Transition
Plan we are giving householders and businesses the incentives and
advice they need to cut their emissions, we are enabling the
energy sector’s shift to the trinity of renewables, new nuclear
and clean coal, and we are stepping up the fight against fuel poverty.
Contacts:
Department of Energy and Climate Change
Phone: 0300 068 5219
nds.decc@coi.gsi.gov.uk
Erica Herrero-Martinez
Phone: 0300 068 5226
erica.herrero-martinez@decc.gsi.gov.uk