E.ON Launches Full Commercial Operations at Holford

E.ON Ruhrgas's UK subsidiary, E.ON Gas Storage UK, has announced that it has begun commercial operations at its Holford Gas Storage facility in Cheshire, England.

E.ON, which began construction on the storage facility in 2005, will phase the opening of the storage units built into the facility.

The company has opened the first three caverns of the facility, making a current capacity of 60 billion cubic metres available for commercial supply. The opened three caverns are three of the eight caverns contained in the facility, with the remaining five due to be opened by the end of 2012. The storage facility will have a total capacity of 160 million cubic metres when all eight caverns are launched.

Jo Visor, the manager director of E.ON Gas Storage UK said the launch was a "milestone" for UK energy supply.

"This is a major milestone not just for our teams who have worked so hard on this project but for the whole of the UK," she said. "Without question the Holford gas storage project will provide a vital resource throughout the year and will play a central role in helping to provide secure gas supplies to the UK.

"Creating and preparing the caverns for commercial operation has involved many complex engineering and solution mining techniques and our ability to draw on the expertise in our UK and wider pan-European team has been crucial."