German power production from coal and gas-fired plants dropped below 1 TWh for the first time on record last week, with demand hit by a holiday last Monday and as solar and wind peaked at a new high of 52 GW Wednesday.
Also, there was steady baseload supply from lignite and nuclear power plants as well as reduced Alpine demand due to increased hydro production, an analysis of power generation data showed.
Output from coal-fired power plants was 0.67 TWh in week 23, according to transparency data aggregated by Fraunhofer ISE, with only the Christmas week in 2015 registering a lower coal plant output over recent years.
Output from major CCGT gas plants that report under transparency rules was 0.32 TWh, the lowest weekly production since August 2015 and only minimal additional CHP demand with many smaller plants not required to report, the data showed.
Beyond the Whitsun Monday holiday, the key reason for the downward trend was a surge in wind power last week with combined wind and solar production.
Overall, wind generated 2.1 TWh last week, a seven-week-high, with solar adding 1.4 TWh and other renewables (biomass, hydro) boosting output to 4.8 TWh, the weekly data showed.
Nuclear production reached a 2017-high last week with 1.5 TWh, while lignite plants provided a stable 2.4 TWh baseload output.
Drilling into the hourly data for Wednesday, the solar and wind peaks also impacted lignite plants amid hourly prices turning negative, ramping down to 9 GW during the afternoon compared to 15 GW during evening peakload with nuclear output ramping down by just 1.6 GW from a 9 GW peak, hourly data by EEX Transparency shows.
Weekly load and demand was fairly stable compared with week 23 in previous years at 8.9 TWh, the data showed, with export demand falling to a 2017 low amid reduced demand from Austria and Switzerland due to improved hydro production amid the seasonal snow melt.
Week 23 was in contrast to record demand for coal and gas plants at 5.4 TWh in week 3 amid very low solar and wind levels as well as an extended cold spell, the data showed.
In terms of price response, the German day-ahead peakload average dropped to Eur28/MWh, compared with a five-year-high at Eur95/MWh in week 3, data from spot exchange Epex Spot showed.
Forward markets were little affected and the front-month contract rising to its highest level since March at Eur33.45/MWh on the back of a hot summer outlook which could lift demand for coal as well as gas plants, S&P Global Platts pricing data showed.
