Dutch and British wholesale gas prices edged down on Friday morning as higher wind output was expected from Monday and an increase in liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply.
The benchmark Dutch front-month contract at the TTF hub (TRNLTTFMc1) inched down by 0.33 euro to 32.05 euros per megawatt hour (MWh) by 0815 GMT, LSEG data showed.
The November contract (TRNLTTFMc2) was down 0.23 euro at 32.94 euros/MWh.
The British gas price for the weekend was down 0.50 pence at 78.50 pence per therm.
Wind generation in north-west Europe is expected to be around 60% higher by Monday than today which will reduce demand for gas from power plants, according to LSEG data.
On the supply side, total Norwegian export nomination are down by 6 million cubic metres (mcm) to 217 mcm/day, with a 8 mcm decrease in flows to Continental Europe to 166 mcm/day.
North-west Europe LNG send-out is expected to rise by 151 gigawatt hours (GWh) to 2,079 GWh/day on Friday due to increased send-out at the Zeebrugge terminal.
Twenty cargoes are scheduled over the next two weeks, including three newly added shipments, said LSEG gas analyst Dzmitry Dauhalevich.
Analysts at Energy Aspects said there were slightly bearish on TTF Winter-25 prices and see further downside risk due to the continuation of Arctic LNG 2 exports to China.
A third tanker from Russia’s Arctic LNG 2 plant, which is under Western sanctions, discharged its cargo and exited a terminal in China on Wednesday, LSEG and Kpler’s ship-tracking data showed.
“A full ramp-up of exports from both trains would pose the biggest downside risk to our 2026 price forecast, but this is still contingent on a Russia–Ukraine peace deal, which remains unlikely in the coming months,”
Another geopolitical risk is further sanctions on U.S. and EU Russia.
On Thursday, EU Energy Commissioner Dan Jorgensen said the EU is sticking to its deadline to phase out Russian oil and gas imports by 2028, after a meeting with U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday the EU was considering a faster phase-out of Russian fossil fuels as part of new sanctions against Moscow.
The 2028 phase-out plan would fix the EU’s Russian energy ban into law. But sanctions require re-approval from EU countries every six months. The EU could agree its 2028 phase-out and, on top of this, pass sanctions to ban Russian energy imports sooner.
Von der Leyen did not specify on Wednesday how the EU would use sanctions to phase out Russian energy sooner. Brussels is currently drafting a 19th package of sanctions against Russia
In the European carbon market, the benchmark contract (CFI2Zc1) was down 0.37 euro at 75.17 euros a metric ton.
Source: Reuters