Imperial Continental Gas Association plc was a leading

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

gas Gas is one of the four fundamental states of matter (the others being solid, liquid, and plasma). A pure gas may be made up of individual atoms (e.g. a noble gas like neon), elemental molecules made from one type of atom (e.g. oxygen), or ...

utility operating in various cities in

Continental Europe Continental Europe or mainland Europe is the contiguous continent of Europe, excluding its surrounding islands. It can also be referred to ambiguously as the European continent, – which can conversely mean the whole of Europe – and, by ...

. It was listed on the

London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pau ...

and was a constituent of the

FTSE 100 Index The Financial Times Stock Exchange 100 Index, also called the FTSE 100 Index, FTSE 100, FTSE, or, informally, the "Footsie" , is a share index of the 100 companies listed on the London Stock Exchange with (in principle) the highest market ...

History

The Company was formed by Sir

Moses Montefiore Sir Moses Haim Montefiore, 1st Baronet, (24 October 1784 – 28 July 1885) was a British financier and banker, activist, philanthropist and Sheriff of London. Born to an Italian Sephardic Jewish family based in London, afte ...

and some of his colleagues based in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

in 1824 as the ''Imperial Continental Gas Association'' to establish

utilities in other counties. It commenced operations distributing gas in

Hannover Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German States of Germany, state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the List of cities in Germany by population, 13th-largest city in Germa ...

in 1825 and providing gas lighting in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

in 1826 under the supervision of the Prussian Count Eduard of Dyhrn-Waldenburg-Schoenau. During the course of the 19th century it established gas works in

Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

and

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

. Its operations in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

began in the mid-1840s; the head office from 1883 to 1902 was at the Palais Epstein.

Sir William Congreve, 2nd Baronet Sir William Congreve, 2nd Baronet KCH FRS (20 May 1772 – 16 May 1828) was an English soldier, publisher and inventor. He pioneered rocket artillery and was renowned for his development and deployment of Congreve rockets. He was also a Tory M ...

was general manager from 1824. The noted

philanthropist Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...

Goodwin Newton Thomas Henry Goodwin Newton (1835–1907) was the chairman of Imperial Continental Gas Association (now known as Calor Gas), one of the United Kingdom's largest energy businesses. He used "Goodwin" as his main christian name, which became a fami ...

Barrells Hall Barrells Hall is a large house in the Warwickshire countryside near Henley-in-Arden. The nearest village is Ullenhall, which for many years was the estate village, large parts of it having been built by the owners of Barrells Hall, the Newtons, on ...

, and

Glencripesdale Estate The Glencripesdale Estate is a country estate situated along the south side of Loch Sunart, a sea loch in the west highlands of Scotland. Today, the Isle of Càrna is the last remaining part of a once huge acre deer forest, river and grousemo ...

was Director and Chairman for a long period in the late nineteenth century. In the early twentieth century Sir

Henry Birchenough Sir John Henry Birchenough, 1st Baronet, (7 March 1853 – 12 May 1937) was an English businessman and public servant. Early life and education Birchenough was born in Macclesfield, Cheshire, the second son of John Birchenough, a silk manufac ...

the future president of the

British South Africa Company The British South Africa Company (BSAC or BSACo) was chartered in 1889 following the amalgamation of Cecil Rhodes' Central Search Association and the London-based Exploring Company Ltd, which had originally competed to capitalize on the expecte ...

also served as a director of the company. It established the ''

Westergasfabriek The Westergasfabriek is a former gasworks in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, now used as a cultural venue. History In the 19th century the Imperial Continental Gas Association (ICGA) built four coal gas plants in Amsterdam: the Eastern Gas Factory ...

'' gas works in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

in 1883. In 1928 it established

Distrigas Distrigas was a natural gas company based in Belgium. In addition to Belgium, the company operated also in France, the Netherlands and Germany. On 1 November 2012, Distrigas merged with Nuon Belgium and became Eni Gas & Power NV/SA, a wholly owned ...

, the main gas distributor in

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

, which is now owned by Eni. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

its operations in

were nationalised by the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

Government. In 1969 the Company acquired all the shares in Calor Group that it did not already own. In 1986 it rejected a bid from ''Gulf Resources & Chemical Corporation'', a company controlled by the

Barclay brothers Sir David Rowat Barclay (27 October 1934 – 10 January 2021) and Sir Frederick Hugh Barclay (born 27 October 1934), commonly referred to as the "Barclay Brothers" or "Barclay Twins", were British billionaires. They were identical twin brothers ...

. Instead in 1987 it broke itself up into Calor Group (now owned by SHV) and Contibel (now owned by

Tractebel Tractebel is a Belgian subsidiary which provides consultancy and engineering services in the energy, water, nuclear and infrastructure sectors for the ENGIE group, as well as for national and international institutions and customers in the publ ...

History

References

Further reading