Underground Gas Storage is playing an increasing role in European gas markets in order to match supply and demand of gas and to ensure the security of gas supplies. In addition, despite the persisting economic crisis and the consequent reduction of the gas demand, during the last years the storage operators are requested to offer a wide range of services to allow the optimization of the delivery system and to ensure a reliable supply of gas. This trend is, perhaps, even more marked in Italy considering the strong dependence on this energy source.
Lately, in this Country, storages, and more in general E&P business, are " under popular investigation" after the Emilia Romagna earthquake of May 2012 because of the suspicion that the tremors may have been triggered by storage activities in that area. So, following the increasing demand of safety and knowledge by the population living around storages, Edison Stoccaggio entrusted O.G.S. (National Institute of Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics), an Italian Public Research Institute, with the task to develop the Collalto Seismic Network (RSC - Rete Sismica di Collalto) in order to obtain a high-quality service, as well as to provide transparent information and public data.
The RSC has been operating since January 2012. Based on the first three years (2012-2014) of monitoring data, the RSC detects all earthquakes down to about a local magnitude of 0.0 in the area surrounding the reservoir; thus it is a very effective solution to recognize a possible seismicity phenomena induced by storage activities and to allow to the storage Operator to activate promptly the proper actions to face the above said phenomena before any consequence for the environment and the safety of people living around the storage.
