Snapshot - 21 August 2026
European gas and power moved higher again on Thursday, with the impulse coming from the supply side rather than the weather. An unplanned outage at a Norwegian processing plant tightened available capacity, Norwegian nominations to the UK slipped, and a hardening of US sanctions policy toward Iran added a risk premium on top. NBP day-ahead settled in the low 160s in p/therm terms, up around 3 per cent, and the front of the gas curve moved with it. Summer 2027 gained more than 4 per cent, the largest move on the board.
Power followed gas but held back, with UK day-ahead baseload settling in the low £140s per MWh for a gain of under 1 per cent. Strong afternoon solar left the system long and dragged prices into the low £100s per MWh through the late afternoon, before a sharp evening tightening lifted system prices close to £190/MWh. Forward power was firmer and more even, with the winter and Q4 contracts adding a little over 2 per cent and Calendar 2027 in the high £90s per MWh. Nuclear availability is thinning as another unit came off for maintenance today.
In the wider complex, crude settled higher on the sanctions news before easing this morning, coal firmed modestly, and European carbon added close to a euro while the UK allowance was flat - widening the UKA discount and quietly supporting UK gas-fired margins. European storage remains the structural concern, with the EU aggregate in the low 60s per cent and Germany only around half full. Sterling was little changed against both the euro and the dollar.
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