The price of gas in Europe remains volatile despite the increase in Norwegian production
The Dutch and British wholesale prices of gas moved slightly upwards on Thursday morning, as the temperatures are expected to drop in the next few days. Norwegian exports also increased following an unplanned maintenance.
LSEG data shows that the benchmark Dutch front-month contract was up 0.42 to 32.42 euros/megawatt hour or $11.14/mmBtu at 0918 GMT.
The British gas front-month price increased by 0.72 pence, to 80.85 cents per therm.
The British day-ahead contracts was up 1.75 cents at 80.10 pence per therm.
The latest forecast shows no change in the fundamentals. Temperatures are expected to remain steady. Yesterday's Commitment of Traders Report showed a very slight net gain in length held by Investment Funds after weeks of decline.
Auxilione stated that "in the coming days the summer delivery period is ending and we will enter the winter deliveries period, where we may start to see more volatile market prices due to the weather impacting the market."
As planned maintenance at the fields supplying to the Karsto processing plant is being eased out, total Norwegian imports have increased by 21 million cubic metres per day. Saku Jussila, LSEG analyst, expects a 16 mcm/d rise in the total Norwegian production on Friday.
LSEG data shows that in Northwest Europe the non-local distribution zones demand (which refers to power generation gas demand) is expected to increase by 70 gigawatts per day at 2035 GWh/d on upcoming day due to falling wind speeds.
Gas Infrastructure Europe data shows that Europe's gas storage is 82% full.
The benchmark contract on the European carbon markets was down by 0.56 euros at 76.46 euro per metric ton. (Reporting and editing by Ed Osmond; Marwa Rashad)
(source: Reuters)
