Prices jump as Iran launches multiple strikes on Israel targets
With the US-Iran deadlock showing no sign of lifting, the market still maintains a sizeable risk element in forward pricing.
Norwegian output continued to strengthen on Friday, offsetting concerns about upward revisions to short-term demand forecasts.
According to data from offshore operator Gassco, flow nominations into the UK’s Easington terminal reached 59.1mcm- almost doubling from 33.2mcm on the same day last week.
This helped to offset a moderate increase in system demand, while at the same time, redirected some volumes toward British storage facilities, which are trending far below the same time last year.
A similarly calm end to last week for baseload power prices. A modest increase in average wind speeds across last week helped to ease demand for relatively expensive gas-fired generation.
According to data from Elexon, wind power averaged at a rate of 8.6GW Mon-Sun, increasing from 5.7GW the week prior and accounting for 34.7% of system demand. Gas stepped slightly lower to 5.7GW (from 6.8GW) meeting around 23% of overall demand in the same period.
Iran fired multiple waves of ballistic missiles at Israel overnight Sunday, marking the first direct strikes from Iranian territory since the 8th April ceasefire. Tehran has explicitly tied this latest bombardment to Israel’s continued military operations in Lebanon.
Meanwhile, Russia and Ukraine traded heavy, targeted strikes on critical energy infrastructure over the same weekend. Ukraine launched hundreds of drones targeting areas more than 1,000 kilometres (620 miles) from the front lines, hitting naval arsenals and fuel hubs in the St.
Petersburg region and the Kronstadt naval base. Conversely, a Russian drone strike heavily damaged the Centralised Storage Facility for Spent Nuclear Fuel near Chernobyl, prompting a fierce international backlash.
If you want to see more information on the wholesale market trends subscribe to our weekly report here.
Price commentary courtesy of Crown Gas and Power 