Natural gas prices remain at historically high levels – however, muted worries about supply shortages now appear to be having an impact. Meanwhile, Gazprom has lifted the delivery freeze to Italy.
The price of European natural gas has fallen noticeably. The futures contract TTF for Dutch natural gas fell in the morning by around 6 percent to 160 euros for one megawatt hour. At 155 euros, it temporarily reached its lowest level since the end of July. The Dutch futures contract TTF is a benchmark in natural gas trading in Europe.
In addition, after a short supply stop, Russia wants to pump gas through Austria to Italy again. The Russian state-owned company Gazprom has now announced that a solution to the problem has been found with the Italian customers. Gazprom stopped supplying gas to Italy over the weekend. The partially state-owned Italian group and largest gas importer Eni saw “absolutely no geopolitical reasons” for the delivery stop. Rather, problems arose with payment details in rubles or euros.
“Concerns about supply shortages this winter may have been dampened by a recent IEA report,” write Commerzbank’s commodity experts. Only if no energy-saving measures are taken and only a small amount of liquid gas is imported will gas storage facilities drop to a critical level of 5 percent, according to the IEA. “With a reduction in gas consumption by around 10 percent below the 5-year average, however, a gas storage level of 25 percent could be achieved,” writes Commerzbank.
Natural gas prices are therefore still at a very high level in historical comparison. However, on August 25, the TTF price had temporarily risen to $311. At that time, the lack of deliveries via Nord Stream 1 drove prices up.
