Wind Drops as Gas Climbs Above €100

Dutch day-ahead baseload prices rose sharply in Week 44, averaging €232.8/MWh, up €99.0/MWh week-on-week, with peak prices moving similarly. The increase came mostly from two aspects, namely less wind and more expensive gas. Wind output dropped well below Week 43 levels, mainly from Thursday to Sunday. Surrounding countries as Belgium and Germany had a very similar pattern. With less renewable supply, gas-fired plants were needed in far more hours and in higher quantity. At the same time, day-ahead TTF climbed steadily through the week, which substantially increased the variable costs of those gas plants. So gas plants set the price more often, and at a higher cost level. The pattern across the week shows this clearly. Monday and Tuesday still cleared below the previous week. Prices then rose from Wednesday and moved sharply higher once the wind dropped on Thursday. This is both for NL Baseload and NL Peakload. The weekend saw the largest contrast: in Week 43 strong wind pushed gas largely out of the merit order and kept prices low, while in Week 44 weekend prices stayed close to weekday levels because gas remained marginal throughout.