Rough (facility)

Rough is a natural gas storage facility under the North Sea off the east coast of England.

It is capable of storing 100 billion cubic feet of gas, nearly double the storage capacities in operation in Great Britain in 2021.

First opened in 1985, it was closed by Centrica Storage Ltd in 2017 because of the need for costly maintenance, the UK government declining to subsidise repairs.

[1] Centrica gained approval from safety inspectors for the facility to be brought back into service in August 2022,[2] and it was partly reopened on 28 October 2022.

The facility had made a profit for its owners by exploiting the difference in gas price between summer and winter.

[9] However, this business model became harder to operate as the global market in liquefied natural gas developed.

[9] In June 2017, Centrica announced the closure of the Rough gas storage site on the grounds that it was uneconomical and had reached the end of its design life.

[5] Subsequently, Centrica indicated that they are working to restore storage operations at Rough which would depend on securing subsidies from the British government.

[14] Additionally, there is an onshore gas-processing terminal at Easington, which compresses gas and transfers it offshore to the Bravo complex through a 36-inch (91 cm) pipeline.