Energy Market Report - 30 April 2026
Energy markets traded sharply higher into Thursday as geopolitical tension over the US blockade of the Strait of Hormuz pushed a renewed risk premium across gas, power, and the wider commodity complex. The notable exception was carbon, which fell after the EU Commission adopted a new state-aid framework allowing member states to cap consumer exposure to high wholesale electricity prices.
Natural Gas
NBP front-month and front-season contracts firmed throughout Wednesday afternoon, with the day-ahead settling at 115.00 p/therm, up 9.90 p/therm, and Win-26 closing at 118.10 p/therm, a gain of 7.80 p/therm. TTF tracked the move, with May-26 at €46.85/MWh and Win-26 at €45.98/MWh. Norwegian flows weakened on Thursday morning to 287 mcm/day from 304.9 mcm/day on Wednesday, as planned maintenance at Gullfaks and Oseberg began - removing a combined 21.5 mcm/day - while UK deliveries via Vesterled and Langeled were nominated 11 mcm/day lower. Wednesday also saw unplanned outages at Asgard, Gullfaks and Sleipner, though Asgard returned within day. LNG remains supportive: the GasLog Savannah delivered into Gate, four further cargoes are scheduled into north-west European terminals over the coming week, and UK send-out is stable at around 13 mcm/day. UK storage at 8 per cent and German storage at 24 per cent both indicate a heavy injection task through summer.
Electricity
The UK forward curve tracked gas higher, with Win-26 baseload settling at £98.73/MWh, up £3.86, and Sum-27 at £75.85/MWh. The prompt told a different story: the day-ahead settled at just £53.39/MWh - down £13.13 - and the day-ahead peak crashed to £26.50/MWh, with N2EX clearing five hours below zero on Wednesday afternoon as combined wind and solar output forced thermal generation off the system. Looking ahead, the UK nuclear outage schedule tightens materially from early May, with Torness-1 going fully offline tomorrow for 27 days, Heysham 1-2 offline from 4 May for 54 days, and Sizewell B units beginning sequential outages from 20 May. Continental forward power followed gas higher, with German Win-26 at €111.64/MWh and French Win-26 at €89.96/MWh.
Other Commodities
Brent crude settled at $118.03/bbl on Wednesday, up 6.08 per cent on the day and 15.82 per cent on the week, with prices testing four-year highs above $126/bbl in early Thursday trade before correcting. WTI followed to $106.88/bbl. Coal ARA CIF Cal-27 added 3.67 per cent to $122.46/tonne, with the back of the curve also firming. Carbon broke ranks: EUA Dec-26 fell €1.91 to €73.20/tonne and UK ETS Dec-26 dropped £2.27 to £49.45/tonne after the EU's Middle East Crisis Temporary State Aid Framework was adopted, allowing reductions of up to 70 per cent on the gas-driven component of wholesale electricity prices. Asian JKM M+1 firmed 2.94 per cent to $16.96/MMBtu but did not meaningfully divert Atlantic LNG, while the UAE confirmed its departure from OPEC and OPEC+ effective 1 May, a move markets read as policy flexibility rather than near-term supply change. Sterling held around 1.3473 GBP/USD, easing modestly as the dollar strengthened on the crude move.