UK wholesale natural gas prices climbed on the open Tuesday as the system opened short on the back of outages affecting supply allied to demand beating original forecasts.
National Grid 10:00 am (0900 GMT) demand forecasts for Tuesday were up at 285 million cu m, some 88 million cu m higher than the seasonal norm, with physical flows running at 262 million cu m/d.
Due to the short system, NBP spot prices increased in value on the open, as within-day and day-ahead were seen trading at 33.20 pence/therm and 33 p/th respectively in comparison to the Monday day-ahead assessment of 31.60 p/th.
Gas export capacity at the UK's Dimlington terminal was reduced to zero overnight due to a compressor trip according to Perenco UK, with restart attempts due during Tuesday's gas day.
Moreover, Rough's withdrawal capacity was reduced due to an overnight trip as well as offshore maintenance removing 4 million cu m/d of withdrawal capacity being extended by 48 hours according to owner and operator Centrica Storage.
Elsewhere, Norwegian gas flows into the UK National Transmission System were running at 76 million cu m/d, split between Easington and St. Fergus at 25 million cu m/d and 51 million cu m/d respectively according to Norwegian gas operator Gassco.
Kollsnes maintenance works are due to begin at the start of Wednesday's gas day with a 24.5 million cu m/d volume reduction for a 24-hour period.
Regasification rates from the South Hook LNG terminal rose early Tuesday to 44 million cu m/d, with Dragon sendout steady at 5 million cu m/d.
Two Qatari LNG tankers, the Aamira and the Al Huwaila, are due to berth at South Hook before the end of the month after the Tembek berthed late Monday.
Pipeline imports from the Netherlands were running at 10 million cu m/d Tuesday morning, with IUK 10:00 am export nominations increasing to 25 million cu m.
On the NBP curve, contracts found support from the firmer prompt as front -month May was dealt at 31.19 p/th and the Q3 16 contract was changing hands at 30.25 p/th.
Winter 16 and Summer 17 were seen trading at 36.60 p/th and 33.61 p/th respectively.
