PARIS (Reuters) – Both European spot and forward curve power prices reached contract highs on Thursday as French nuclear supply was further reduced and restarts were delayed, while renewable supply is expected to fall in Germany.
“The new normal of records being broken on an hourly and daily basis comes on the back of surging gas prices and reduced power from renewables and nuclear,” Rystad analyst Fabian Ronningen said.
French nuclear availability fell 1 percentage point to a much reduced 41% of available capacity as the 1.3 GW Paluel 4 plant went offline with an unplanned outage. [POWER/FR]
The outage will allow maintenance on a valve located on the emergency supply circuit of the steam generators in the non-nuclear part of the facility, power group EDF said.
The restart of 5.2 gigawatts (GW) of reactors has been delayed to at least mid-November, at a time when France is importing from neighbors, stressing gas supplies in other countries that are trying to fill their storage ahead of the winter.
German baseload power for delivery on Friday rose 1.6% to 687 euros a megawatt-hour (MWh) at 0925 GMT, after reaching a contract high of 692 euros earlier.
The equivalent French price gained 9.4% to 700 euros/MWh, after reaching a contract high of 710 euros.
Wind power supply in Germany is forecast to drop 2.8 GW to 4.9 GW, while solar supply is seen down 1.6 GW to 8.6 GW, Refinitiv Eikon data showed.
Wind power output in France is expected to rise 920 megawatts (MW) to 3.1 GW, the data showed.
Consumption in Germany was seen down 900 MW to 55.5 GW on Friday, while demand in France is expected to fall 1.4 GW to 44.4 GW.
Along the curve, traded forward power contracts in Germany and France reached highs across the board, tracking rising fuel costs.
The German year-ahead baseload power contract soared to a contract high of 750 euros/MWh, up 13.6%.
The French 2023 baseload contract also jumped to a contract high of 865 euros/MWh, up 8.8%.
European CO2 allowances for December 2022 expiry shed 0.3% to 88.95 euros a tonne.
(Reporting by Forrest Crellin; editing by Kim Coghill)
