10 Security of supply

Transmission of natural gas is currently Gasunie’s core function. In the Netherlands, this function is fulfilled by Gasunie Transport Services (GTS) and in north-western Germany by Gasunie Deutschland (GUD). As transmission system operators (TSOs), they are responsible for the management, proper functioning and development of high-pressure transmission networks. The transported natural gas represents enormous value¹³: in the region of € 27 billion.

Responsibilities of GTS include:

• managing, operating and developing the gas transmission network on an economic basis;
• monitoring a safe, reliable and efficient transport system;
• providing sufficient transport capacity;
• maintaining the connection with other networks, both national and international;
• performance of a number of public duties (see below);
• managing gas quality;
• balancing the network; and
• issuing annual advice on security of natural gas supply.

The Dutch Gas Act also assigns GTS a number of duties that serve the public interest. 

• GTS must take action in the situation where a natural gas supplier fails to deliver gas to small-scale consumers. In such a situation, GTS is required to guide the procedure as well as possible – possibly by temporarily taking over the supply of gas – so that, in accordance with the procedure, the small-scale consumers affected can get their gas from another supplier as soon as possible.
• GTS is also responsible for ensuring that small-scale consumers (i.e. homes, large buildings and small industrial parties) continue to receive sufficient gas when temperatures drop to -9°C or lower. To fulfil this duty, GTS must contract volume and capacity itself. 
• Lastly, GTS ensures that the gas from small fields can be included in the gas transmission system.

ACM supervises the execution of GTS’s statutory duties. In the Netherlands, the Gas Act (up to 2026) and the Energy Act (from 2026 onwards) stipulate how GTS must fulfil its duties.

In Germany, Gasunie subsidiary GUD has statutory and public duties that are broadly comparable to those of GTS. German regulator BNetzA oversees the fulfilment of these duties.

Resilience policy

Gasunie’s assets are classified as ‘vital infrastructure’. Energy transmission, import and storage are so vital to society that outages or interruptions may affect security of supply, which can lead to serious social disruption and even pose a threat to national security and resilience.

Geopolitical instability and digital threats have led to an increased focus on our current resilience measures across all Gasunie business units and an increased focus on business continuity and overall resilience. There is a general awareness across our company that these aspects need ongoing attention.

At Gasunie, we distinguish between the concepts of safety and resilience. While safety focuses on preventing accidents and protecting people, resilience is aimed at countering external threats such as cyberattacks, sabotage or espionage. Both are of great importance, but they require different approaches.

Collaboration and responsibility

Gasunie seeks to take responsibility for everything within its sphere of influence. At the same time, we recognise that certain threats, such as military or hybrid attacks, require a broader approach. Therefore, we have aligned our strategy with fellow network operators through the Dutch and German industry associations for network operators and work closely with the responsible ministries and other government authorities in both countries. This collaboration is essential to protecting our critical infrastructure and to ensuring the continuity of energy supply.

Types of resilience

We distinguish four different types of resilience: physical resilience, IT resilience, staff resilience and resilience in procurement and tendering. We recognise that the interconnection between the different types is essential for the timely identification and effective handling of potential risks. Since a vulnerability within one type almost always has direct implications for the other types, internal collaboration and information exchange are crucial. This increases the ability to be proactive, boost resilience and reduce risks.

LNG Netherlands (MT)

Ever since Russian gas supplies were cut off, liquefied natural gas (LNG) has played a crucial role in ensuring security of supply in the Netherlands and Europe. As Gasunie, we contribute to this through our joint ventures EemsEnergyTerminal and Gate terminal. Both terminals are an essential part of the infrastructure needed to ensure sufficient volumes of natural gas.

EemsEnergyTerminal 

By September 2025, EemsEnergyTerminal had been in operation for three years. Within a very short time span, this floating LNG terminal has grown into an essential part of the energy supply in the Netherlands. Over the summer months of 2025 (June, July, August), the terminal was run at full capacity, turning out over 2 billion cubic metres of gas, which covers 7% of the total annual gas consumption in the Netherlands and is key to topping up gas storage facilities. The terminal is fully booked up through to the end of 2027.

Given the continuing need for LNG import capacity, Gasunie and fellow shareholder Vopak intend to keep EemsEnergyTerminal operational for longer than initially planned. The Dutch government has stated that keeping up the required LNG import capacity for the Netherlands is relevant to the robustness of the gas system, and that they are looking into extending the operational period for EemsEnergyTerminal. Talks with market parties on new contracts are underway.

Gate

Gate terminal in Rotterdam remains a mainstay of Dutch LNG import capacity. The terminal’s current fixed annual capacity across tanks 1 to 3 is 12 bcm. Once the new tank 4 is operational, the fixed annual terminal capacity will rise to 16 bcm. In addition, Gate offers a further 4 bcm per year in non-fixed capacity (without additional storage capacity) to parties that have booked fixed terminal capacity. The terminal’s full fixed capacity has been booked up until 1 September 2036. From 1 September 2036, 5 bcm of the annual fixed capacity will be available. From 1 October 2039, 10 bcm of the annual fixed capacity will be available. No capacity has been booked beyond 1 October 2046. All non-fixed capacity has been booked up until 1 October 2036.

The terminal plays an important role in the efficient and sustainable processing of LNG. Using heat from seawater and waste heat from a nearby power plant, Gate converts the liquefied natural gas it receives into gaseous form in an energy-efficient manner. This contributes to Gate’s cost-effectiveness and ensures a strong competitive position in the European LNG landscape. For Gate’s new fourth terminal, which is expected to be completed in the second half of 2026, market parties booking capacity will be required to inject at least 11% bio-LNG.

LNG Germany (MT)

German LNG

Gasunie has been one of the initiators behind the German LNG project to build a dockside LNG terminal in Brunsbüttel from the beginning. This terminal will ultimately offer capacity to regasify 10 bcm of natural gas every year, supplying the resulting gas to the German grid. The FID to build this terminal was made in 2024. The foundations for two LNG tanks have meanwhile been laid. The investment costs are borne by three shareholders: Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) on behalf of the German government (50%), RWE (10%) and Gasunie (40%). Gasunie will be operating the terminal.

Connection

Five temporary LNG terminals (floating storage and regasification units, or FSRUs) are currently being installed on Germany’s North Sea and Baltic Sea coasts. Because two of these are moored in the Gasunie Deutschland network area (at Brunsbüttel and Stade), GUD was commissioned to connect these terminals to the grid. Both pipelines were laid in 2024. The FSRU at Brunsbüttel has been operational since early 2024 and will be decommissioned as soon as the dockside LNG terminal is put into operation. The FSRU at Stade has not yet been put into operation due to some misalignment between the commercial operator of the FSRU and the terminal operator at Stade. For the dockside LNG terminal to be able to take over from the FSRU terminal at Stade, GUD will have to extend its connection pipeline between its network and Stade by 18 kilometres. GUD aims to have this pipeline ready in 2027.

To handle the large volumes of gas entering the network from the LNG terminals, GUD is building a new pipeline (ETL 182) further up its network, stretching out over some 87 kilometres. This pipeline is expected to be completed in late 2027.

Compression

A considerable part of the LNG coming in is needed to supply the east and south of Germany and neighbouring countries. Since this will require the gas pressure to be increased, GUD is building a new compressor station at Achim West. In order to reduce the carbon emissions from this compressor station, which will operate extensively, it will be fitted with three electrically powered compressor units. The first two of these compressor units are planned to be commissioned in late 2026, with the third one following in early 2027. This will reduce GUD’s natural gas consumption significantly from 2027 onwards.

Besides the import of LNG, imports from Norway form another key support for the security of gas supply in Germany. Located on the North Sea coast, the Rysum compressor station provides the pressure to enable transport capacity for Norwegian gas volumes. Since the supply of Russian gas through the Nord Stream pipeline was cut off, Rysum has been operating virtually non-stop all year long. We will be upgrading the Rysum station and making it more energy efficient. The aim is to make an investment decision in 2026 and start building in 2027.

Resilience (ST)

Our focus on resilience is fourfold. 

• Together with fellow network operators through the Netbeheer Nederland trade association, we have drawn up a resilience strategy that underpins the Gasunie resilience programme addressing military, hybrid and other kinds of threats. We are also coordinating this with the Ministry of Climate Policy and Green Growth. 
• We fulfil an advisory role in the legislative process for acts such as the Dutch Energy Act (specifically for Section 3.18, which contains passages on the elimination of risk from procurement and tendering) and bills such as those for the Critical Entities Resilience Act and the Cybersecurity Act, which are both currently being considered in the Dutch House of Representatives.
• In building new energy infrastructure and replacing parts of existing infrastructure, ‘security by design’ is a guiding construction principle. An important focus is the protection of critical infrastructure in the North Sea. We are collaborating with various ministries on a plan to enhance the resilience of critical infrastructure in the North Sea. 
• We are actively preparing for a range of crisis situations through scenario-based exercises. These exercises are used to develop organisational, technical and individual response capabilities. This is how we strengthen not only our systems, but also our people’s resilience.

Vulnerabilities and resilience

Due to incidents such as the Nord Stream explosion, sabotage of cables and rail infrastructure, and drone activities over critical assets, it has become increasingly urgent to protect the energy system. Electricity, natural gas, hydrogen and digital networks are interconnected, meaning that failure in one system can have domino effects on others. Digitalisation and automation increase complexity and the risk of cyberattacks, while manual operations are decreasing.

In the second half of 2025, Gasunie and GTS analysed the resilience of our networks within the Dutch energy system, providing a basis for further collaboration and policy development aimed at ensuring security of supply and a safe Dutch energy system, with Gasunie positioning itself as a value chain coordinator. The analysis looked more closely at measures to reduce vulnerabilities and increase resilience. For security reasons, these measures are not detailed in this annual report.

Following years of monitoring and advice on the current and desired filling levels of gas storage facilities, Gasunie will publish a vision on gas storage and its role within a resilient energy system in early 2026.

Since ensuring our physical and IT resilience is part of our regular business operations, the money we spend on this is included in our operating expenses.

In Germany, the term is understood to mean the number of times that our infrastructure was unable to supply sufficient gas to customers. The scores attained by Gasunie in the Netherlands and Germany are added together to produce the total score. The standard we have set ourselves is that the number of transmission interruptions in any one year can never exceed six.

Uncontrolled events

Uncontrolled events are incidents involving gas leaks (of natural gas, biomethane, hydrogen, nitrogen, air) of over 14,000 m³ from a Gasunie-operated pressure holder with a rated pressure of 8 bar or higher. Our goal is zero incidents, but we do acknowledge that incidents may occur. The internal threshold value we go by is a maximum of two uncontrolled events per year.

Affecting the gas supply to the Etten-Leur GRS, the second interruption was caused by a valve at the Zegge M&R station being left in the wrong position after works had been carried out. Gas supply to the customer was interrupted for a total of two hours. As soon as the interruption was reported, the valve was opened and gas supply restored.

Uncontrolled events

There were two uncontrolled events in 2025 (2024: 0). A technical review showed that both these uncontrolled events were caused by leaks resulting from external corrosion. The corrosion occurred due to a disruption in the cathodic protection system; this disruption was caused by stray currents from the nearby railway line. These currents were transferred to the pipelines through the earth sheath of a crossing 10kV power cable, which led to accelerated corrosion. Measures have been taken in response to these incidents to prevent a recurrence.