Wienerberger Group, the world’s largest producer of bricks and the market leader in clay roof tiles, has announced that the company took the opportunity to secure natural gas capacity of 25 gigawatt hours (GWh) at the Haidach storage facility in Salzburg, Austria.
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The company has been working intensively in recent weeks and months to ensure that all its 220 production sites around the world will be securely supplied with energy in the future. To this end, the company has drawn up its own emergency plans and cooperated closely with the national authorities.
Since 1 August 2022, it has been possible for Austrian companies to store gas at the Haidach (Salzburg) gas storage facility.
Wienerberger used the opportunity to invest in the security of gas supply, securing a total gas capacity of 25 gigawatt hours (GWh) at the Haidach storage facility for the company. Wienerberger is one of the first companies in Austria to take advantage of the Haidach storage facility.
Based on the consumption of 390 GWh of gas per year at all production sites, 25 GWh would be sufficient to keep Wienerberger’s roof tile and clay block plants of strategic importance for the Austrian economy in operation for a longer period of time in the event of a substantial cut in gas supply.
Haidach is the second largest gas storage facility in Central Europe; the entity responsible for gas storage is RAG Austria AG.
“Since the outbreak of the Russia/Ukraine conflict, gas supply has been secure in all our markets. In recent years, Wienerberger successfully diversified its business model and has thus become much more resilient than in the past,†said Heimo Scheuch, CEO.
"However, we do not expect geopolitical tensions to ease in the second half of the year and foresee continued economic effects of the conflict. We are intensifying our investments in the conversion of production to sustainable energy sources. Depending on local availability, electricity, hydrogen, biogas or synthetic gas can be used.
"At the same time, within the framework of our ambitious decarbonization strategy, we are focusing on process improvements in order to reduce energy consumption. Having secured the supply of natural gas from the Haidach storage facility, we have now found a solution for Austria that will enable us to guarantee the continued operation of our production sites." ■