An initial phase worth 33 million euro ($36 million) of a 70 million euro project for the construction of an underground natural gas storage in central Croatia has been completed, Croatian underground gas storage firm Podzemno Skladiste Plina (PSP) said on Thursday.
A new natural gas station in Grubisno Polje has started operating, paving the way for the construction of the underground natural gas storage facility, PSP said in a press release.
The facility will be Croatia’s second underground natural gas storage, along with the existing one in Okoli in the Sisak-Moslavina county.
The first phase involved building the central gas station and access pipelines to the transport system. It took 15 months to complete.
“In the next two-three years, we will extract natural gas from this depot, aiming for about 150 million cubic metres. In the trial phase, we already achieved a daily production of 275,000 cubic metres, surpassing the expected annual 40 million cubic metres,” PSP CEO Vlado Vlasic said. This puts PSP’s share at over 10% of the country’s total natural gas production, he added.
The Grubisno Polje project is recognised by the economy ministry as a strategically important investment. It will enhance the safety, stability, and flexibility of the national natural gas system, ensuring a reliable supply to users in Croatia and neighbouring countries.
Grubisno Polje represents a significant energy infrastructure project aligning with the planned expansion of the LNG terminal on the island of Krk. The goal is to increase its capacity from 2.9 billion cubic metres to 6.1 billion cubic metres annually, Croatia’s prime minister Andrej Plenkovic said during the opening of the station.
PSP was founded by Croatia’s state-owned gas transmission system operator Plinacro.
