Baker Hughes sued over gas storage valves

Houston

BAKER Hughes Inc used the wrong kind of steel in safety valves installed in a US$2.5 billion German underground gas storage field, where ruptures last year rendered some caverns inoperable and threaten to make the entire facility worthless, according to a lawsuit.

Triuva Kapitalverwaltungsgesellschaft mbH, which owns 47 natural gas storage caverns in a massive salt dome under Etzel, Germany, that warehouses 15 per cent of the country's gas supply, claims Baker Hughes supplied defective safety valves that "can crack wide open" if welded into place in a corrosive environment, according to a complaint filed on Monday in Houston federal court.