Near-term UK wholesale natural gas prices edged higher in early Thursday trade on the back of a short system ahead of the long weekend, with the NBP curve following suit.
National Grid 10:00 am (0900 GMT) figures put the UK gas system short by 8 million cu m, as physical flows of 248 million cu m/d were behind demand forecasts for the day of 255 million cu m.
Within-day and day-ahead were seen trading at 38.85 pence/therm and 39 p/th respectively compared with the previous day-ahead assessment of 38.275 p/th, with the weekend contract (for Friday-Monday delivery) done at 38.55 p/th.
Norwegian gas flows failed to recover after the Kvitebjorn outage was resolved overnight, running at 90 million cu m/d Thursday morning according to Norwegian gas operator Gassco.
Storage withdrawals ramped up to cover the demand hike, with Rough at 8 million cu m/d and Holford at 12 million cu m/d.
UK gas production nominations for Thursday were 108 million cu m according to Platts Analytics' Eclipse Energy.
LNG regasification from South Hook was steady at 31 million cu m/d ahead of the arrival of the Al Sheehainiya vessel Friday and the Shagra Tuesday.
Gas exports to Continental Europe were nominated at 46 million cu m, according to IUK 10:00 am figures.
Front-month May was seen trading at 38.65 p/th, 0.30 p/th higher than the previous assessment, with the Q3 17 and Winter 17 contracts changing hands at 38.70 p/th and 46.55 p/th respectively.
