In 2025, Creos moved deeper into delivery, reinforcing the electricity grid, strengthening resilience, and embedding flexibility as electrification accelerates and energy flows become more dynamic. Hydrogen also progressed toward implementation through regional coordination, with HY4Link marking an important step. At the same time, digital initiatives such as Leneda are improving transparency and customer control over energy data. Across these priorities, the focus remains clear: reliable operations, higher service quality, and safety as a non-negotiable daily standard.

Carole Brückler, you are the new Chairwoman of Creos. What direction do you want to set for the company in the coming years?

Carole Brückler: Creos must remain a highly reliable operator, able to develop and run the networks the country needs, not only for today, but also for what comes next. We operate in a rapidly changing environment: geopolitics, technology, and societal expectations are moving faster than before, while public policy sets clear priorities such as the green and digital transitions.

I see a real opportunity for Creos to be proactive, not simply to wait until someone asks us to be ready, but to shape the future together with society and industry. Decarbonization is a good example: part of industry will electrify, which means electricity demand will rise; other processes may rely on hydrogen, which requires its own infrastructure. We can model scenarios, but we cannot predict with certainty what choices every industrial actor will make ten years from now. That uncertainty is accelerating, and it means we need stronger capabilities in data, decision support, and flexibility management.

On the customer side, the system is becoming more dynamic. Consumers are increasingly also producers, from rooftop PV to larger renewables installations, creating a more decentralized balance between consumption and production than we had only a few years ago.

In 2024, Creos updated its strategy. What made that evolution necessary, and what does the strategy look like today?

Laurence Zenner: The operating environment is evolving inside and outside the company: geopolitics, of course, but also the energy transition and a renewed focus on resilience and security of supply, something that is very much in the DNA of a network operator, and even more visible today.

Customer expectations are evolving, too. Our customers are captive, they don’t “choose” Creos, so it’s essential that they feel well served, advised, and supported, rather than feeling they’re “dealing with a monopolist.” Meanwhile, regulation is tightening, so we need a clear framework to remain high-performing and deliver consistently against rising requirements.

And then there’s digital disruption, including artificial intelligence. It will increase demand through data centers and computing capacity, but it also creates opportunities to serve customers better and improve internal efficiency. All of that makes it healthy and necessary to revisit the strategy regularly.

The fundamentals haven’t changed, but we have structured our work into three strategic pillars: Develop, Digitalize, Dedicate. “Develop” focuses on continuing to build networks with the required capacity and resilience and anticipating future needs. “Digitalize” captures our ongoing transformation into a hybrid entity, combining the infrastructure of cables, substations, and pipelines with the growing dimensions of an IT and data company. This shift is driven by the convergence of infrastructure and data, which now intersect at every point.

This includes data management, end-to-end processes, and system flexibility. “Dedicate” centers on people. By that, we mean both our customers and our teams, as we are scaling efforts to ensure reliable and safe delivery in a customer-centric and motivating work environment.

The strategy also reflects new operating realities: electricity demand is rising, consumption behaviors are changing, and the system must integrate new concepts such as flexibility, and potentially new forms of market participation for industrial players.

These three pillars are translated into 15 cross-functional initiatives, specifically to avoid silos and strengthen end-to-end execution. And because delivery ultimately comes down to people, we thank all Creos employees for their commitment and the work delivered in 2025.

A major electricity priority is reinforcing the grid, including the move in the North from 65 kV to 110 kV and the broader Project 380. What does this bring in terms of security of supply and capacity?

L.Z.: We plan based on several inputs: customer requests for injection and offtake capacity, and the national framework including the National Energy and Climate Plan, which informs our scenarios. From that, we build network development plans for very high-voltage and high-voltage grids, and for distribution.

Those analyses showed that reinforcement is required. Projects like Project 380 are designed to increase grid capacity so we can grant more capacity to customers, for both consumption and production. On resilience, the principle is to build durable, redundant networks with backup options, so that a fault on a line doesn’t compromise supply.

We are planning with horizons out to 2040, because what we build now must serve not only today’s needs but tomorrow’s demand as well. Demand is rising faster than existing capacity, not only in Luxembourg but across Europe. This is why reinforcing the grid is urgent.

Where are you on Project 380 specifically, and what are the next milestones before construction?

L.Z.: At the end of 2024, the Ministry of the Environment issued its recommendation on the overall corridor. In 2025 we refined that route and launched initial procurement for key components such as transformers and GIS stations.

In parallel, we are progressing with the authorizations, the land requirements, easements, and the plots needed. Engineering work continues as well: for example, each pylon must be designed and dimensioned individually before it can be ordered. Our objective remains to commission the line by the end of 2029, once authorizations are secured, components are delivered, and the infrastructure is installed.

Beyond individual flagship projects, grid reinforcement is part of a broader modernization effort. How are you managing that system-wide transformation, and how do you see the investment effort evolving over the next few years?

C.B.: We are approaching it as a system-wide transformation, not a collection of isolated projects. That means aligning network planning, permitting, procurement, and execution capacity while strengthening digital tools and customer-facing processes because the transition involves data and service as much as cables and substations.

On investment, Creos is among the country’s largest industrial investors. We invested around €175 million last year, and our annual budgets could rise to €300–350 million in the coming years. That reflects the scale of electricity grid reinforcements, continued high-voltage upgrades, and the preparation of hydrogen infrastructure. Throughout, our priority remains unchanged: deliver safely, reliably, and with disciplined project governance.

Gas remains an important pillar in the energy system. How is Creos preparing the future of the gas network while maintaining day-to-day safety and reliability?

L.Z.: We know that, looking toward 2050, transporting methane will progressively decline as a core activity, but we don’t yet have a definitive view of the full phaseout pathway. Today, there is still demand, and our mission is to ensure supply for all customers connected to our network.

What has changed is that we are no longer extending the network: the last planned extensions have been completed, and we follow the target plans agreed with municipalities. Operationally, we also reorganized our gas teams to strengthen transversal management across sites, improve planning, and better integrate field operations, while keeping local teams in place.

Hydrogen is moving from ambition to execution, with Creos designated as Luxembourg’s national hydrogen network operator and several cross-border backbone initiatives taking shape. What are the key priorities in the next few years, and where does HY4Link fit in?

C.B.: Our first priority is to translate hydrogen policy into a deliverable infrastructure plan. Creos Luxembourg Hydrogen was designated as Luxembourg’s national hydrogen network operator in November 2025, which comes with clear expectations on planning, transparency, and coordination with neighboring systems.

On the demand side, the most immediate use cases are energy-intensive industrial players that cannot decarbonize through electrification alone. That is why we are preparing the foundations for a first hydrogen distribution network in the South, close to the industrial basin. This will allow us to meet early demand with reliable timelines and clear connection pathways.

Beyond the physical build-out, hydrogen infrastructure has to be investable. These are long-lived assets, amortized over decades, so the framework matters as much as the engineering: demand visibility, financing conditions, risk-sharing mechanisms, and the safeguards a network operator needs to commit to major investments. In short, ambition must translate into bankable projects.

HY4Link is a key piece of that puzzle. It is a planned cross-border hydrogen transport corridor designed to connect Luxembourg with Belgium, France, and Germany, and ultimately link into the broader European hydrogen transport vision. Put simply, it aims to ensure that Luxembourg is connected to future supply routes and neighboring industrial demand.

This connectivity matters because it enables hydrogen to move across borders, rather than remaining confined to isolated national projects. HY4Link has also been awarded Project of Common Interest (PCI) status, which can open access to EU instruments such as the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) and typically raises the bar in terms of governance, permitting, and cross-border coordination.

Making such a corridor work in practice requires close alignment with our neighboring operators, particularly France’s NaTran and Belgium’s Fluxys, so that technical standards, connection points, market arrangements, and operating rules converge. A shared European “rulebook” plays an important role here. In EU terms, these are the network codes: harmonized rules that define how cross-border networks are operated and how market participants access them, covering interoperability requirements, operational procedures, data transparency, and the conditions for moving energy safely and efficiently across borders. Without that common framework, physical interconnection alone would not be enough to deliver a smooth, scalable hydrogen market.

Leneda, the national energy data platform, has been officially launched. What changes do you expect now in terms of usage, adoption, and service to customers?

L.Z.: Leneda is already gaining traction: by the end of 2025, 16,175 private users and 709 professionals had completed onboarding. It gives customers greater transparency and control. Users can access electricity and gas consumption and electricity production data close to real time, typically with the most recent validated data available up to “yesterday.” They can also manage who can access their data, so they remain in charge.

Another important element is the Energy ID, which already exists today. When users register, Leneda assigns a unique identifier that helps simplify and speed up everyday energy procedures, such as switching supplier, moving, or requesting certain connection-related changes.

From a market perspective, Leneda modernizes data exchanges by enabling secure, standardized sharing between authorized actors, such as suppliers, network operators, and other market parties. It also makes it easier for customers to share data with trusted third-party service providers when they choose to.

Finally, trust and security are non-negotiable. Access is protected through strong authentication, including LuxTrust or IDnow, in line with data protection requirements.

Creos is reinforcing its organization with two new roles: Head of Customer Success and Head of Digital & Customer Experience. What will change in practice?

L.Z.: The aim is to improve consistency and ease of interaction from the very first customer contact. The Customer Success role covers continuous improvement and complaint handling, but also brings customer care and contracting closer together, ensuring that customers don’t feel as if they’re being sent to different places for different inquiries. The direction is clear: fewer handoffs, more “single point of contact” logic, and simpler access, with a goal of having one phone number for contractual requests and one for emergency troubleshooting.

We have also introduced customer satisfaction indicators: for example, the “Customer Satisfaction Score”, a rating on a 1–5 scale, and the “Customer Effort Score” to measure whether customers get the right outcome on the first attempt or need multiple interactions. In that spirit, our Customer Satisfaction score was 4.04/5 in 2025. Our objective is to reach 4.1/5 in 2026.

The Digital & Customer Experience role is there to continue end-to-end digitalization, more digital contracts, smoother onboarding, and practical uses of AI to support both customers and internal teams, especially as the environment becomes more complex.

You mention accelerating on data and AI. What are your priority use cases and what benefits do you expect for operations and network planning?

L.Z.: We already use our digital twin KOPR as the basis for machine learning and simulation. It supports work planning and network development planning, helping us model capacity constraints and new consumption patterns such as EV uptake, and it incorporates external variables such as weather impacts on renewable production.

Beyond that, we are developing practical AI support for service teams. For instance, when the new low-voltage tariff and “reference power” concept were introduced, customer queries increased significantly. We built an internal, in-house AI-based tool that is fed detailed rules, to help our Customer Care teams answer questions faster and more consistently, in a secure environment.

We are also working on AI-enabled optimization of field interventions. This involves prioritizing work based on network criticality and safety, as well as reducing travel time. Our longer-term ambitions include predictive maintenance to anticipate failures and better prioritize investments.

Safety and health at work remain central. What do you expect from the latest initiatives, in the field and in support teams?

L.Z.: Safety and health are the foundation of our activities. Some roles are more exposed than others, so everyone has a responsibility to work safely and management has a duty to provide the right context, tools, and leadership.

Culture is key. Over the past two years we have continued a program of cultural change, involving teams more actively. Twice a year we hold safety conferences for critical functions. Now, they are in a much more participatory format, with workshops and shared discussions rather than a one-way “lecture.”

We encourage reporting not only on incidents, but also on near-misses and potential risk situations. We launched an internal app to make reporting easier. To reinforce governance, a second designated employee for occupational safety and health was appointed in January 2026. The objective is a proactive, transparent culture: the more we report, the more we prevent, and the more we build trust and learning across teams.

Download the annual report 2025.