Energy Market Report - 08 September 2026
Conflict in the Gulf dominated trading on Monday, lifting gas, power and crude together as the market repriced supply risk rather than reacted to weather. UK gas settled at its highest front-season levels since January 2023, power tracked it higher across the winter contracts, and carbon added a further layer of cost to thermal generation.
Natural Gas
Prices rose across the board because the supply picture deteriorated on several fronts at once. Norwegian outages reported by Gassco cut roughly 30 mcm/day at Kollsnes, Troll and Asgard on top of planned works holding capacity reductions between 68 and 87 mcm/day through the week, while the continuing IUK outage is pushing UK gas out via BBL rather than relieving the Northwest European balance. NBP day-ahead settled at 182.00 p/therm, up 3.00p, with Oct-26 at 182.25 and Winter 26 at 183.04 p/therm. Continental hubs held their premium, TTF day-ahead pricing at 184.37 p/therm equivalent. The structural support remains storage: European inventories are around 66.6 per cent full, roughly 20 percentage points behind the four-year average, with Germany near a record low of 53 per cent, and LNG arrivals into Northwest Europe continue to trail last year's volumes despite a heavily US-weighted delivery schedule this week. UK LNG sendout was flat at around 8 mcm/day and UKCS production steady at 79.70 mcm/day.
Electricity
Power followed gas, with the nuclear fleet doing much of the work at the front of the curve. Monday's day-ahead baseload settled at £127.62/MWh against £72.76/MWh on Friday, though the comparison spans a weekend delivery day and overstates the underlying move; the day-ahead peak at £109.71/MWh again settled below baseload as strong afternoon wind briefly drove system prices to £34.11/MWh before the evening ramp lifted them to £213.77/MWh. Close to 2.5 GW of nuclear capacity is currently unavailable, with Heysham 2-8, Torness 1, Heysham 1-1 and Hartlepool 2 all offline and a further derating at Heysham 1-2 running into next year, which leaves CCGT setting price through the peaks at a time when fuel costs are rising. Forward power firmed accordingly, with Oct-26 at £141.78/MWh, Q4-26 at £147.40 and Winter 26 at £146.71/MWh. The return of the 1.4 GW North Sea Link interconnector helps the UK balance, but lower hydro output and continuing French nuclear maintenance are limiting any downside on the Continental curve, and a 24-hour strike at the French nuclear operator has been called for next Monday.
Other Commodities
Brent M+1 settled at $97.00/bbl, up $0.72, and has extended to multi-week highs this morning following an attack on Saudi energy infrastructure, with reports that supertanker departures from the Gulf have effectively stalled since last Wednesday. Coal was the exception, with API2 ARA Cal-27 easing $1.32 to $133.14 per tonne. Carbon firmed in both schemes: EUA Dec 26 settled at €84.74 per tonne and UK ETS Dec 26 at £60.43 per tonne, leaving the UK allowance at roughly a £12.35 per tonne discount to its European equivalent and adding directly to the cost of gas-fired generation. In global LNG, JKM M+1 held at $25.14/MMBtu and Henry Hub spot at $2.92/MMBtu, while European spot values firmed to $24.64 at NBP and $24.95 at TTF. Sterling was unchanged against the euro at 1.1642 and marginally firmer against the dollar at 1.3538, offering no meaningful offset to dollar-priced imports.