Energy Market Report - 01 October 2026
The new gas year and the winter delivery season both began today with European energy markets firmly bid, as unplanned Norwegian supply outages and a storage position well behind last year outweighed otherwise mild conditions. Gas and power both settled higher on Wednesday while crude eased back towards $100/bbl and carbon drifted lower, leaving the complex pulling in more than one direction.
Natural Gas
Prompt gas firmed into the gas year roll on supply disruption rather than demand. Unplanned outages at the Njord and Troll fields curtailed just over 11 mcm/day, and with near-term temperature forecasts revised downwards, day-ahead NBP settled 5.00 p/therm higher at 178.00 p/therm while Dutch TTF day-ahead was assessed at €73.80/MWh. The Winter 26 contract expired at 183.675 p/therm, far above where it began trading in January. The forward curve stepped up with the prompt, November 2026 settling at 183.08 p/therm, December at 184.73 p/therm and January 2027 at 185.61 p/therm, each adding more than 6 p/therm, before the strip falls away to 146.35 p/therm in April 2027 and a 124 to 135 p/therm summer band. The anchor under those winter contracts is storage: GIE puts EU inventories at 71.54 per cent, over 11 percentage points behind the same date last year and well short of the 87 per cent five-year average, and the German government has now instructed state-owned SEFE to inject a further 8 TWh before 15 December. Fundamentals have loosened this morning, with Norwegian exit nominations up to 321.1 mcm/day as Troll maintenance returns, flows to the UK around 20 mcm/day higher led by Langeled, and the system opening 22 mcm/day long, though UK LNG sendout remains thin at roughly 5 mcm/day.
Electricity
Power rose much further than gas. Day-ahead baseload settled at £160.11/MWh, up £42.44 on the session, with the peak at £166.00/MWh, and since gas added only the equivalent of around £3.40/MWh in fuel cost while carbon fell, generation margins for gas plant widened considerably. Realised prices support the move, with the system averaging £136.50/MWh through Thursday morning against £101.92/MWh across Wednesday, when prices ranged from £3.37/MWh late in the morning to £214.95/MWh in the half hour to 09:00. The curve gained £4.29 to £4.65 across the winter, November 2026 at £150.50/MWh and January 2027 at £153.46/MWh, before Q2 2027 steps down to £107.46/MWh and Calendar 2027 settles at £116.55/MWh. Wind rose to 47.9 per cent of the stack with renewables above 60 per cent and gas at 23.0 per cent, but nuclear availability is stretched, with three units fully offline on planned work, three more derated by unplanned outages and a further Heysham 1 outage starting 3 October for 96 days. Interconnector imports roughly halved, leaving domestic plant to cover more of the call, and continental spot prices stayed above the UK at €195.18/MWh in Germany, €202.33/MWh in France and €196.98/MWh in the Netherlands.
Other Commodities
Crude moved against the gas complex, with Brent M+1 settling $4.56 lower at $98.03/bbl as recovering Gulf exports and a surprise build in US inventories eased supply concerns, and prices have steadied near $100/bbl this morning while investors weigh renewed US-Iran diplomatic activity. Washington is still considering a diesel export ban, which would tighten Atlantic distillate balances if enacted. Coal continued to firm, with API2 ARA CIF Cal 2027 up $1.93 at $136.13/tonne, a tone more consistent with European winter anxiety than with the softer crude picture. Carbon eased on both sides of the Channel, EUA Dec 26 down €0.86 to €85.09 per tonne and UK ETS Dec 26 down £0.45 to £61.41 per tonne, leaving the UKA at a discount of roughly £11.30 per tonne once converted at prevailing rates, narrower by about £0.50 on the day. In global gas benchmarks, JKM M+1 added $0.30 to $25.74/MMBtu while Henry Hub spot slipped $0.17 to $3.02/MMBtu, keeping the transatlantic arbitrage wide and US cargoes pointed at Europe. Sterling firmed modestly against both the euro and the dollar, at 1.1701 and 1.3265 respectively.