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Gasunie
THE RELIABLE SOURCE

Gasunie is a trading company and gas carrier. The company’s primary activities are the purchase, transmission and sale of gas at home and abroad. Gasunie’s policy is aimed at ensuring its own continuity both as a leading European gas supplier with access to extensive reserves, and as a provider of a wide variety of services, including capacity and back-up.

In 1998 gas sales of Gasunie totalled 79.8 billion cubic meters, of which export sales totalled 36.4 billion m3. Germany, Belgium, France, Italy and Switzerland are long-standing customers. With a 24% share of the total primary gas consumption in the European Union, Gasunie is the largest EU-based gas supplier.

The natural gas Gasunie purchases is drawn from fields on the Dutch mainland and in the Dutch sector of the North Sea. Gas is also imported form Norway and the United Kingdom. Russian gas will start flowing to the Netherlands from 2001 onwards. The Netherlands has gas reserves of its own extending to well beyond the year 2030. An estimate of the current reserves of Dutch gas comes to 1,875 billion m3. Including imports under existing long-term contracts from other countries, Gasunie’s total gas stock on January 1, 1999 was 2,450 billion m3.

Gasunie manages a gas transmission system consisting of a pipeline grid with a total length of around 11,600 km. The system furthermore comprises compressor, blending and export stations.

With a turnover of NLG 17 billion (around USD 8.3 billion), Gasunie is a strong market player. Over the past five years (1994-1998) Gasunie has invested NLG 1,410 million (around USD 690 million) in the Netherlands. (Exchange rate: August 4th 1999)

Gasunie deliveries are characteristic in their high degree of flexibility. This flexibility is based on a unique supply capacity. Gasunie holds, contrary to the other large suppliers for the European gas market (Russia, Norway, Algeria), a special position as a low load factor-supplier. In order to deliver its entire annual contractual volume Gasunie only needs to load its transmission system for 3,000 hours, whereas the other three suppliers supply under a high load factor (7,200 to 8,000 hours). The remaining Gasunie capacity for purposes of flexible supplies is almost as large as that of the three other suppliers.

Together with safety, security of supply is one of the first commandments in developing and sustaining gas markets. Security of supply includes, for example, reducing to a minimum the risk of supply failure, and, moreover, the capacity of being able to continue providing supplies even during periods of highest peak demand. Gasunie has an excellent record of 35 years of uninterrupted supply.

In response to the increasing competitive market, Gasunie has introduced the Commodity Services Systems (CSS). This new tariff system, operative as from January 1st 1999, offers customers a made-to-measure package whereby gas, transmission services and capacity services are supplied as separate components.

Through its market oriented programmes, Gasunie is applying its expertise in the service of the different market sectors. In the public distribution market Gasunie works together energy companies, manufacturers and suppliers on developing and introducing onto the market new gas appliances or improved versions, like gas-fired washing machines and dryers, solar-gas boiler combi-devices , micro total-energy installations. Through Gasunie’s Environmental Plan for Industry all technical feasible possibilities for improving energy efficiency are being identified through co-operative projects with industrial customers and related to cost aspects. Since the start of Gasunie’s EPI the 340 projects resulted in savings of around 750 million m3 of natural gas; this is the equivalent of about 300,000 Dutch households.

Through Gasunie Engineering, Gasunie places its expertise and experience at the service of the needs of the natural gas market, ranging from policy formulation and commercial operation to engineering and implementation.

For further information about us please visit our website: http://www.gasunie.nl