• Nortegas launches an ambitious DUAL Vocational Training Plan
• The company unveils the 2018-19 projects of the Nortegas Learning Centre at Bilbao School of Engineering
• Nortegas is bolstering its commitment to the environment where it operates, by committing to innovation and the decarbonisation of the economy and driving sustainable wealth creation

Bilbao, 24 September 2019.- Training, at all levels, has always been one of the cornerstones on which Nortegas has based its development. As a result of this concern, the company has launched an ambitious plan in order to drive vocational training in its distribution areas thanks to the DUAL VT programmes.

This plan enhances the Nortegas training activity with the Bilbao School of Engineering that has been run at the “Nortegas Learning Centre” for the last decade. This will allow a larger segment of young people to benefit from the learning and training opportunities in the setting of the company’s operations.

DUAL Vocational Training Plan

DUAL VT is a mixed training and employment system where students’ training alternates classes taught in the education centre with in-company traineeships, where the activities are linked to their training leading to their vocational training qualification.

The plan has a dual objective. On the one hand, it implies significant benefits for the students, who learn in real work situations, acquire great professional experience and improve their future employability. On the other hand, the company likewise benefits from the fostering of corporate social responsibility as it becomes a training company and helps to train professionals specialised in our activity.

The first result of the plan has been the partnership agreement, covering work-linked training and grants, signed between Nortegas and the Somorrostro Vocational Training Centre (Bizkaia). This has led to a student on the “Telecommunications and IT Systems” upper level training cycle joining the Remote Control Department. During the 2019/2020 academic year, the student will perform different activities, including monitoring and managing the SCADA system, helping with the design and deployment of the smart meter communications network or carrying out electronic work in the field.

The plan envisages signing new agreements with different training centres of the Basque Country, Cantabria and Asturias, within the current academic year, in order to facilitate the incorporation of new students in different areas of the company.

Nortegas Learning Centre

The Nortegas Learning Centre is part of the scientific-technology partnership agreement between the company and the Bilbao School of Engineering for the students to conduct research, technological development and innovation activities.

The initiative has successfully been up and running for the last decade and, year after year, students have carried out their work with the constant support and advice of the Nortegas Learning Centre tutors and mentors. Forty-nine projects have so far been produced, some of which have even received international awards or special mentions.

An important part of those projects is related to the development of producing renewable gas to be injected in the distribution networks, the digitalisation of the operations, the use of hydrogen, etc., which are some of Nortegas’s key strategic lines.

On 16 September, the Bilbao School of Engineering was the venue for the presentation of the four projects developed at the Nortegas Learning Centre during the 2018-19 academic year.

In the first, Leonardo Vargas, a student on the Master’s Degree in the Integration of Renewable Energies in the Electricity System, has studied different energy alternatives to supply electricity to liquefied natural gas satellite plants. The second, the work of David Pérez, a student on the Master’s Degree in Sustainable Energy Engineering, proposes a solution to adapt the distribution Regulation and Metering Stations (RMS) in order for the injection of gas from renewable sources. In the third project, Clara Rojas, a student on the Master’s Degree in Sustainable Energy Engineering, has designed a mobile CNG unit for special operations, both vent recovery and natural gas compression in distribution networks. And, finally, in the fourth project presented, Yolanda Galarraga, a student on the Master’s Degree in Sustainable Energy Engineering, puts forward a study into different technologies to produce methane from biomass and non-plant waste.

The learning centre’s success is mainly down to the opportunity it offers students to combine learning and working in the energy sector, with the ensuing attraction of university talent to the gas industry, and, above all, to the personal motivation fulfilment for the student from being able to join the world of work and showing their worth before completing their studies.

With the DUAL Vocational Training Plan and the Nortegas Learning Centre, Nortegas is bolstering its commitment to the environment where it operates, by committing to innovation and the decarbonisation of the economy and driving sustainable wealth creation by means of greater investment endeavou.