Transportation
The French transportation network of high pressure natural gas is made up of
35 751 km* of pipeline. This transport network is exploited by two entities:
- GRT gas, a subsidiary of Gas de France, which operates network B in northern France and the main part of network H,
- Total Infrastructures Gas France (TIGF) which operates network H in the south west of the country, the Aquitaine, Midi Pyrénées and part of Languedoc Roussillon.
They have the following obligations according to European Regulations and French transposition laws:
- to guarantee access to the works and installations that transport gas within the country and to transfer natural gas headed for the transportation networks of Spain, Belgium and Italy.
- to refrain from discriminating between the users of the network.
- to act with complete transparence.
These measures make it possible to guarantee that the eligible customers will be able to obtain transportation contracts, whether directly or indirectly, in case they sign deals for the supply of natural gas with any supplier.

Storage
In Europe, the gas industry has developed huge storage capacity inside salt cavities, unused mines, worked out gas or oil fields, or even in geological aquifers. Natural gas is injected under pressure and then drawn more or less easily according to the characteristics of the storage tank.
In France, there are three storage sites located in salt cavities and 12 in aquifers.

The stakes
Underground gas storage constitutes a strategic link in the gas chain, they allow to:
- balance supply and demand throughout the year in spite of irregular consumption during the different seasons of the year,
- ensure security of supplies especially in case of default of a supplying country.
Therefore, storage is essential to ensure continuous supply of natural gas to the public as well as to industrialists. In case of peak consumption on cold winter days, storage contributes to fill more than 60% of demands while foreign supplies and methane tanker terminals account for only 40%.

Underground storage in France
Fifteen sites are being operated at present, 13 by the Department of Major Infrastructures of Gaz de France and 2 by Total Infrastructure Gas France and their total capacity is 110TWh which represents one third of the national consumption.
The law voted on August 9, 2004 provides negotiated access to storage for third parties (ATS). Fees and general conditions of usage are thus offered to operators and negotiated with customers. Gaz de France and TIGF have published standard offers to storage respectively in April 2004 and October 2004.

*in Chiffres clés 2004