Natural Gas: A Commercial Perspective

Andrej Pustišek teaches energy economics at the University of Applied Science, Stuttgart and at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), conducts international courses on natural gas, and consults international natural gas and energy companies, inter alia as expert witness in international arbitrations. He studied Geophysics (PhD in 1988) and Economy in Vienna, Cologne and Münster (PhD in 2005). In 1990, he started working in international natural gas purchasing at Wintershall AG, Kassel, Germany, where he was involved in the conception, drafting and negotiation of various German import contracts - from Russia, the Netherlands, the UK and Norway. As of 1993 he headed WINGAS' natural gas supply logistics department, where he was responsible for transit and storage contracts. During this time he also spearheaded negotiations for natural gas imports to several Central European countries. From 1996 to 2001, he headed WINGAS' natural gas planning and portfolio optimization department, where the conceptual design and pricing of both commodities and flexibility were amongst his main responsibilities. After changing to E.ON Ruhrgas in 2002, he was appointed Senior Vice President International Natural Gas Sales. In this function he successfully established and expanded the company's sales activities in 11 countries and was responsible for strategy, conception, negotiation and operation of gas sales, transportation and storage contracts in several European countries. From 2008 to 2011, he served as Senior Vice President for Portfolio Management, and was accordingly responsible for the design and handling of the company's contractual and asset portfolio. 

 

Michael Karasz currently consults international natural gas and energy companies, inter alia as expert witness in arbitrations. He studied Geology and Business Administration in Cologne. With more than 25 years´ hands-on experience in the European energy industry, his commercial expertise covers the whole value chain of the natural gas business from upstream to end-user delivery. In particular, he has successfully negotiated and concluded a variety of complex, long-term sales and purchase, transportation, and storage agreements. Additionally, he has a proven track record of exploiting short-term options in long-term contract portfolios and their optimization. He has extensive expertise in preparing and successfully executing complex international arbitration cases. His long-standing work in the natural gas business started in the early 1990s at WINGAS. After holding different senior management positions both in Germany and Central & Eastern Europe with E.ON, EEX, RWE, and Bayerngas, he founded THE ENERGY HOUSE GmbH in 2011.

He is co-author of a leading German textbook on risk management in the energy business ('Risikomanagement im Energiehandel').