LONDON: Prompt natural gas prices in Britain fell early on Monday as healthy supplies from Norway and lower demand from gas-fired power generators led to a fairly balanced system.
Prices for within-day delivery were trading at 49.80 pence per therm at 0912 GMT, down 1.50 pence since their last settlement. Prices for delivery on Tuesday were down 1.10 pence at 49.45 pence per therm.
With supply flows at about 204.7 million cubic metres (mcm) per day on Monday and demand expected to be about 207.5 mcm, the system was just 2.8 mcm undersupplied, National Grid data showed.
Norwegian imports via Langeled were flowing at around 70 mcm/d on Monday morning according to National Grid, up from around 40 mcm during the day on Friday.
Langeled is Britain's main sub-sea gas import route with a total capacity of around 70 million cubic metres per day (mcm/d).
Demand for gas from utilities also fell on Monday on the back of higher forecasts of wind power generation.
Some 3,500 MW of wind power generation is forecast for Monday, according to National Grid data, up from less than 1,000 MW the previous day.
The higher wind power output has helped offset reduced generation from Britain's nuclear plants. Six reactors with a generating capacity of 3,445 megawatts (MW) are currently offline.
Further along the curve, the November gas contract was down 0.75 pence at 54.20 pence per therm, while the December contract slipped 0.60 pence to 56.65 pence per therm.
In Britain's power market, the nuclear outages helped to push up prices. Power for day-ahead baseload delivery traded at 45.80 pounds per megawatt hour, up 1.80 pounds.
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