The Lithuanian natural gas transmission system operator (TSO) Amber Grid has signed an agreement with Navitasoft’s strategic partner IP Systems to deliver a standard commercial services solution (in some parts of Europe called a commercial dispatching solution), along with custom developments to meet national regulatory requirements. The new system brings Amber Grid many new functions to address the changing gas market, along with the flexibility needed for a future-ready IT infrastructure.
The gas markets in the Baltic States and Finland are going through extraordinary and globally unique changes. EU rule-based market liberalization has the potential to bring real benefits for end-user customers in the form of greater competition and prices that reflect global supplies. However, in order to create the conditions for this to happen, these states needed significant infrastructure developments such as interconnectors (Baltic Connector) and LNG terminals, as well as building up the gas interconnection between Poland and Lithuania (GIPL) that will connect Polish and Lithuanian as well as Baltic and Finnish natural gas transmission systems with the EU system. The market merger model these countries are adopting is one-of-a-kind. Europe has previously seen different types of balancing zone mergers, where a TSO IT system has been adopted by a neighboring smaller market (e.g. Belux or Denmark-Sweden), or where multiple TSOs collaborated to create IT services beyond standard TSO solutions like in France and in Germany.
“We are already seeing right now just how complex it is to merge two zones into a single one in the case of Germany. Despite being under one national regulation, the Trade Hub Europe zone adoption is a long and demanding process. If we look at the Eastern Baltic Sea states it gets even more complicated: we are talking about four zones, under four different national regulations. These four countries liberalized their markets when they could learn from the hard lessons other countries made during the earlier liberalization process, and now the Baltic market merger model could put them well ahead of others and serve as a role model for future cross-country market mergers in the European Union,” said Kornel A. Balogh, Head of Business Development at Navitasoft.
In 2019-2020 Navitasoft provided the Common Zone Platform that enabled the Estonian and Latvian TSOs to merge their natural gas balancing zones, with the ultimate vision of creating a regional balancing zone together with Lithuania and Finland at a later stage. “Navitasoft’s unique experience with the first Baltic market merger played a significant role in the selection process,” said Justas Černiauskas, Head of System Management Center and Project Manager of this project at Amber Grid. “In addition, their commercial services solution not only puts us in a strong position to handle major planned changes in the gas market, but also provides a modern IT infrastructure with the flexibility to adapt to unforeseen changes and to react to new trends. Grid operators today must be prepared for the faster pace of change that is becoming the norm in our industry. Amber Grid is committed to innovative approaches to facilitate such change and to support an integrated European gas market.”
Amber Grid’s adoption of software from the same vendor would allow the Lithuanian operator to seamlessly join the Common Zone Platform in the future. The system also prepares Amber Grid to handle the additional future challenge of joining one of the three capacity booking platforms (PRISMA, RBP, GSA) once a GIPL interconnector is operational by the end of 2021.
The new commercial services platform supports the highest standard authentication and security features, and will enable advanced, fully integrated services for nomination, allocation, capacity management and balancing operations. Shippers and dispatchers will benefit from a modern, ergonomic, user-friendly application for their everyday use, while standardized APIs and automatic data exchange protocols will enable more technologically advanced shippers to set up and configure automated business processes with Amber Grid, thus easing market entry for shippers from other European regions. Shippers already active on the Lithuanian market will be able to simplify their operation through the new features.
A trusted partner to European TSOs
With Amber Grid, now seven power and/or natural gas TSOs rely on Navitasoft’s commercial services solution, including all three Baltic operators. Across Europe, a total of 14 system operators have been using Navitasoft applications.
“Our track record among gas TSOs is unique. No other European IT company has delivered a modular commercial dispatching platform solution in so many countries, for so many natural gas TSOs within the EU. This experience has made us the experts in adapting to highly diverse national regulations,” said Ákos Füzi, CEO of IP Systems. “We have developed a standard platform that not only supports a wide variety of regulatory environments, but is also flexible enough to easily continue to support new countries, as well as whatever changes the market may bring. This project establishes our presence in all three Baltic states and provides a springboard into our next growth market, the Nordics.”
In supporting Amber Grid and other gas TSO customers, Navitasoft relies on its decade-long experience in developing, maintaining and supporting its Operator Suite, including the commercial dispatching solution (TSO-OS) and its award-winning balancing and trading platform (BAL NC-OS), as well as its capacity booking platform (Gas Capacity-OS). Navitasoft’s experience gained during the development of the Common Zone Platform in Estonia and Latvia not only benefits Amber Grid with a later entry into this zone, but could also have potential applications for other countries considering gas market integration, such as Croatia and Hungary.
About Amber Grid (Lithuania)
AB Amber Grid is the operator of Lithuania’s natural gas transmission system and is in charge of transmission of natural gas (transportation of natural gas through high pressure pipelines) to system users, along with the network’s operation, maintenance and development. Customers of AB Amber Grid are large companies (power plants, district heating plants and industrial companies) as well as medium-sized companies operating in Lithuania and gas supply companies, to which AB Amber Grid renders natural gas transmission services.
Shareholder structure of AB Amber Grid: a state-owned UAB EPSO-G (Lithuania) holds a 96.58% stake, minority shareholders hold a 3.42% stake.
AB Amber Grid is a full member of ENTSOG (the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Gas).