Albury Gas Storage, Surrey, United Kingdom

Star Energy's £134m Albury Gas Storage Project is located in Surrey, UK. The Albury Plant is being built as part of the company's plan to build up storage facilities in order to cope with the fluctuations in demand for gas.

The sharp increase in gas prices seen in the UK in recent years has happened to a lesser extent in Europe because it has more gas storage, allowing gas to be purchased and stored when the market price is low and resold at a later date when the price has increased. This way the gas storage company can make a profit while helping keep prices on an even keel because at times of high demand there are additional supplies to draw on.

Star Energy

Star Energy is setting up a gas storage infrastructure to complement its facilities at Humbly Grove in Alton, Hampshire, UK, which opened in November 2005 and has a capacity of ten billion cubic feet.

This facility operates by taking gas from the national transmission system at Barton Stacey via a 17 mile pipeline and then depositing the gas in the Humbly Grove oilfield. The gas is stored for later use but increases the pressure in the oil reservoir, which will boost its useful production life by a further ten years (it has a 20-year lifetime).

The gas odorant, which is usually an alkane sulphide, is removed using a granular catalyst adsorbent prior to storage. Star Energy will also have to take note of possible changes in the gas reservoirs they use because of cycling pressures during charging and depletion of the reservoir.

The initial proposal was to build a gas storage processing facility at Albury Park, but this met with opposition because it is part of an area of outstanding natural beauty. The plans were revised so that the processing facility will be built at Furze Copse, West Sussex.

The gas storage reservoir will be in the sandstone geology of the now depleted Albury Field, which is about 2,100ft below sea level, providing about six billion cubic feet of storage. A second phase to this storage reservoir could potentially provide 24 billion cubic feet of space at a later date.

Albury 1

The phase I project, known as Albury 1, involves the construction of a storage infrastructure. The first stage is the drilling of four 10,000ft development wells at the Albury Well site for access to the reservoir.

There will also be a pipeline from the Albury site to the gas processing site at Furze Copse. The route of this 32in pipeline will go underground west of New Road and then to the east of the road and under the A25, continuing north to the east of Sherbourne Farm.

The construction width will be 26m and the pipeline 5 miles (8.3km) long at a minimum depth of one metre. Construction is expected to last about six months. The gas processing facility and a temporary construction camp will be built on the ten hectare site, taking up about 3.5 hectares.

A temporary pipe store and contractors' staging yard is to be built at East Clandon. The remaining infrastructure will include an additional one mile (1.8km) pipeline connecting the gas processing facility to the local gas grid and an above-ground connection to West Horsley to connect to the gas grid there.

Although the project has the support of the Secretary of State, it is going through an environmental impact assessment, and a positive outcome from this will be used to submit a planning application to Surrey County Council during 2010. In July 2007, the preliminary submission for storage authorisation under the Gas Act 1965 was made and a round of public consultation followed consequently. The preliminary application was approved in May 2008.

Star Energy's future plans

Star Energy has other projects under consideration in the UK. These include developing a further gas storage facility that makes use of the Bletchingley gas field in Surrey for which two appraisal wells have already been drilled at Godstone, Surrey. In addition, the company may submit an application to use the Gainsborough field for gas storage.