Energy Market Report - 15 April 2026
Energy prices fell sharply as geopolitical risk premia continued to unwind across the complex, with the US-Iran ceasefire holding and fresh diplomatic signals pointing to further de-escalation. Mild weather, rising wind output and healthy Norwegian supply added to the bearish tone.
Natural Gas
Gas prices extended their decline through Tuesday and into Wednesday morning as Middle East tensions eased further. NBP day-ahead settled at 108.30 p/therm on Tuesday - down 9.10 p/therm on the day - before slipping to around 105 p/therm in early Wednesday trading, a remarkable fall from the 117 p/therm seen just two days earlier. TTF day-ahead moved from around €45/MWh to €43/MWh over the same period. The primary catalyst was continued deflation of the geopolitical risk premium: the US-Iran ceasefire held despite a military blockade of Iranian ports that turned away six vessels, and President Trump signalled that a second round of talks could begin in Islamabad within days. Fundamentals reinforced the softness, with temperatures running roughly 3.5°C above seasonal norms and pulling system demand down to 166 mcm/day on Wednesday morning. The UK system opened around 20 mcm/day long, supported by LNG send-out of 13 mcm/day and total Norwegian exit nominations of 325.5 mcm/day. European storage has now recorded 10 consecutive days of net injections, sitting at around 29.6 per cent full. Looking ahead, Troll maintenance has already trimmed Norwegian output by 15 mcm/day, and the Vesterled pipeline is scheduled offline from Friday for seven days, removing a further 20 mcm/day of flows into the UK. Further along the curve, Winter 26 gas fell 5.00 p/therm to 106.00 and Summer 27 shed 3.50 p/therm to 79.50, though back-dated contracts showed signs of structural support in early Wednesday trading, suggesting that global LNG economics and medium-term storage dynamics continue to underpin longer-dated pricing.
Electricity
Prompt power led the move lower, with UK day-ahead baseload settling at £77.00/MWh on Tuesday - a £29.50 drop from Monday - as rising wind generation and falling gas prices compressed system marginal costs. Day-ahead peak fell even more sharply, down £34.62 to £71.00/MWh. Wednesday morning offers opened around £82/MWh on baseload as the prompt stabilised, with poor wind expected for the remainder of the week providing some near-term support. Wind output is forecast to peak well above seasonal norms tomorrow before tapering. Seasonal contracts were broadly softer on the prompt but showed divergence further out: Winter 26 baseload eased £1.25 to £92.00/MWh, while Winter 27 rose £1.00 to £77.00/MWh and Winter 28 gained £2.23 to £72.98/MWh. The firmness at the back reflects a congested UK nuclear maintenance schedule, with Heysham 1-1 in a 130-day planned outage, unplanned outages persisting at Heysham 1-2 and Heysham 2-7, and Torness 1 entering planned work from tomorrow. French nuclear output, by contrast, is expected to average 45.5 GW this week - more than 7 GW above the 2021-2025 average - providing a comfortable cushion for interconnected flows.
Other Commodities
Brent crude broke below $100/bbl for the first time in the recent rally, settling at $94.79/bbl on Tuesday - down $4.57 on the day and over 13 per cent on the week. WTI fell to $91.28/bbl, off nearly 20 per cent week on week. The prospect of resumed US-Iran talks was the primary catalyst, unwinding a substantial portion of the risk premium built during the recent escalation. Coal eased alongside the broader complex, with ARA CIF Cal 27 settling at $113.49/tonne, down 1.4 per cent on the day and over 9 per cent on the week. Carbon bucked the trend on Tuesday, with EUA Dec 26 rising €2.28 to €74.87/tonne and UKA Dec 26 firming £3.22 to £46.82/tonne, supported by short-covering and confirmation that EU ETS-covered emissions fell 1.3 per cent in 2025. Wednesday morning saw modest pullbacks in both carbon markets, with liquidity thin after the Easter break.
Outlook
The near-term direction is clearly softer, driven by the continued unwinding of Middle East risk premium alongside mild weather and healthy supply. However, several factors warrant attention: the Vesterled outage from Friday will trim Norwegian flows into the UK, the nuclear outage schedule is congested through May, and European storage - while building - remains at just 30 per cent full. The situation in the Middle East is also fluid, and any reversal in the diplomatic trajectory could rapidly reprice the curve. For now, the combination of fading geopolitical risk, above-average temperatures and a well-supplied system suggests further downside is possible if headlines remain benign.