On Monday, the TTF futures contract for Dutch natural gas started trading at EUR 70.30 per megawatt hour. European natural gas was last this cheap in February 2022, before the outbreak of war in Ukraine. At the beginning of trading, the price of gas rose slightly again and megawatt hours were trading at 73 euros in the morning. Since the beginning of December, the price of the TTF futures contract has almost halved. The record was reached last summer at 345 euros per megawatt-hour. At that time, an interruption in the supply of natural gas from Russia caused prices to rise rapidly.
The main reason for the drop in gas prices is still the comparatively mild winter temperatures, which are lowering consumption. At the turn of the year in Germany there were regional temperatures of over 20 degrees. The German weather service recorded the hottest New Year’s Eve since meteorological records began. In addition, significantly more energy has recently been generated from wind energy, which reduces the consumption of gas to generate electricity.
Thanks to the recent very mild winter, natural gas is still being stored in Germany. According to the latest data from the European storage association GIE, the fill level across all German storage facilities was 90.12% as of December 31st. Gas reserves rose for the 11th straight day after falling for several weeks.
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