Annual Report 2025 – ÖBB-Infrastruktur AG

ÖBB-Infrastruktur Aktiengesellschaft Group Management Report | Consolidated Financial Statements 22 Operations Risks from force majeure and natural hazards are countered by way of established systems and programmes. For example, a natural hazard management system has been implemented (including weather information system, flood information system and natural hazard information map). In addition to other weather-induced risks, flooding represents a significant natural hazard for the rail transport infrastructure in Austria. Numerous precautionary measures have already been taken to counter the risks of flooding, which are continually reviewed and further expanded – including in the context of the extraordinary flood event in September 2024, which caused extensive damage. In response, a comprehensive project was launched to analyse potential natural hazards and to identify and prioritise specific measures aimed at increasing resilience; some of these have already been incorporated into existing regulations and guidelines, while others have already been implemented through structural modifications to enhance the resilience of systems and facilities. The research was conducted by the Vienna University of Technology. The results provide a solid foundation for strategic developments and follow-up projects, for which financial provision has already been made in the current framework plan in the form of a programme, with a view to enhancing resilience to future extreme events. Precipitation can have a major impact on in-house generation of traction current – a dry year can result in a significant difference between the forecast for in-house generation and actual generation. This means that lower volumes have to be covered on the market, whereby higher prices can also be expected in a dry year – the energy price developments and volatilities especially in 2022 have shown that a risk materialising could have a correspondingly high impact. This risk is countered through storage optimisation and a rolling procurement strategy, among other things, in order to minimise the impact in the event of a risk occurring. In the course of the climate risk and vulnerability analysis, no significant long-term climate risks were identified for the company’s own generation of rail electricity, apart from the usual annual precipitation volatilities. Failure risks in respect of all telecommunications services and the main data network services for railway operations are countered with preventive measures to reduce risk, such as emergency plans, creating redundancies or relocating sites. Despite the extremely high reliability of the operations control centres, partial or total failures due to terrorism, sabotage or natural disasters such as fire cannot be completely ruled out. For this reason, a holistic outage concept for key elements such as signal boxes, remote control areas, control centre cells and customer information systems is part of the operations management strategy. To minimise the risk of a decline in revenue and additional costs due to quality problems with systems, regular inspections of the systems are carried out as a measure. Training and information events are organised on an ongoing basis to minimise the risk of accidents caused by ÖBB employees. The risk of terrorist attacks is minimised by way of targeted measures and instructions (behavioural recommendations) as well as through close cooperation with the Federal Ministry of the Interior. In order to be better prepared for the impact of a blackout in terms of infrastructure, specific contingency plans were drawn up for operations and energy management, whilst blackout crisis management team exercises were also implemented – among other things, plans for emergency power supply and alternative means of communication were tested to ensure that critical systems could remain operational for several hours. Similarly, a cyber-attack crisis team exercises were also carried out. The aimwas to review procedures, identify weaknesses and improve coordination between the central crisis management team and regional incident management teams. In addition to the exercises, further specific measures were implemented, such as upgrading the power supply for safety systems and data links. All measures are embedded in the relevant processes and are monitored regularly in order to strengthen resilience to specific crisis scenarios, such as power cuts, cyberattacks or natural hazards, in the long term. A Group-wide blackout prevention project led by ÖBB-Infrastruktur AG was initiated and implemented in 2022. The existing emergency and crisis plans are evaluated on an ongoing basis and reviewed through annual drills. Due to the uncertainties regarding Russian gas supplies and Ukrainian gas pipelines, a step-by-step emergency plan was developed under the leadership of the ÖBB-Infrastruktur Group (with regard to a gas supply stop or an energy rerouting event) and implemented throughout the Group in October 2022. This aims to ensure that, if necessary, rail transport can be maintained even with reduced energy availability through targeted measures.