Scheduling Software Purpose Built for Natural Gas Operations
Natural Gas Traders and Schedulers responsible for overseeing pipeline operations often struggle with managing the logistical complexities of gas in an efficient and transparent way. Schedulers spend a significant amount of time and effort dealing with data quality issues due to the use of spreadsheets and/or the limitations of ETRM or other software products. For the most part, Traders lack the tools to effectively communicate intent to Schedulers, resulting in movements that oftentimes do not align with Trader strategies. These drawbacks expose a natural gas business to losses and limit its ability to capitalize on market opportunities. Additionally, these scenarios force Traders, Supply Managers, and Schedulers to expend significant effort wrestling with data rather than making sound decisions for the benefit of the business.
Scheduling software purpose built for natural gas resolves commonly faced issues, enables unparalleled efficiency, delivering business benefits:
- Maximize margins by quickly and easily identifying the most optimal transportation routes.
- Eliminate manual calculations by leveraging a built-in rate matrix that automatically calculates costs and fuel.
- Increase Scheduler effectiveness via advanced capabilities that eliminate manual effort (e.g., auto-nomination) and accelerate decision-making.
- Nominate from any location with support for all NAESB scheduling types: Pathed, Non-Pathed, and Pathed Non-Threaded.
Bridging the gap between wholesale and retail teams is of paramount importance. Pipeline Traders and Schedulers must have full visibility of how much gas must be purchased to meet retail obligations, and to where these volumes must be scheduled. Imagine having at your fingertips Retail Demand functionality that projects the required delivery to each city gate based on retail activity, such as load forecasting and pool management. And, as requirements at the retail customer level change, the positions that are required at the city gates update automatically – such capabilities exist!
Projecting scheduling activity to assess supply requirements is also important. Software purpose built for Natural Gas Scheduling provides visibility to projected deliveries at storage, interconnect, and city gate positions. These projections can also include fuel calculations to more accurately identify if all downstream obligations are met with existing supply and capacity/transport.
With superior data integrity and insights via a consolidated, 360-degree view of retail and wholesale information, operations staff focus shifts from chasing data and struggling with technology shortcomings towards high value, repeatable business activities. If you have ever wondered how you can ensure a software investment is best utilized and how to maximize your ROI, scheduling software purpose built for natural gas is the answer to enjoying productive and efficient natural gas operations, resolving existing shortcomings, streamlining operations and serving as a powerful instrument for growth.
LDCs, Marketers, Pipelines, Producers, and Utilities face increasing competitive and compliance pressures, requiring increased operational efficiency, data integrity and process improvement. Their operational systems must support this, but most do not. Engage us and we will show you how to make a breakthrough. It’s what we do for natural gas companies, and we are experts in our field.
~Ken
