GERMAN POWER: Year-ahead at 30-month-low on drop in carbon, coal
London (Platts)--20Nov2012/829 am EST/1329 GMT
German year-ahead power prices fell Tuesday to their lowest levels since
April 2010 as a further drop in EUA carbon allowances and coal reduced power
generation costs.
Core contract Cal 13 base was heard trading at Eur46.45/MWh, down 35
euro cent from Monday's close.
On the prompt, prices also eased on the back of a slight increase in
wind power output, with no pressure on demand due to relatively mild
temperatures, a trader said.
Baseload power for day-ahead delivery was last heard before 12:00 London
time Eur4 lower on the day at Eur50/MWh. Day-ahead peakload power was also
Eur4 lower at Eur60/MWh.
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Epex Spot settled day-ahead largely in line with OTC at Eur50.40/MWh for
base, while peakload cleared at Eur59.71/MWh.
Wind power output was forecast to double to 4 GW for average
baseload hours Wednesday, while solar output was forecast just slightly
higher at 4 GW for average peakload hours, according to a market source.
Conventional plant availability for Wednesday improved, with lignite
availability rising to 19.8 GW, hard coal up at 13.5 GW, while nuclear
remained at its full 12.1 GW capacity, according to EEX transparency.
This gives Germany more than 45 GW of conventional plant capacity on top
of any renewable output, which is given priority in the merit order, before
more expensive gas-fired units have to come online.
Load forecast was edging lower with Tuesday's peak at 70.2 GW compared
to Monday's peak a 70.8 GW, according to the latest publicly available data
from European grid portal Entso-E.
Temperatures across Germany are forecast to remain just above the
seasonal average, with CustomWeather pegging Dusseldorf at 1 C above the 3-8
C norm on Wednesday.
On the near curve, December base fell 55 euro cent to Eur46.35/MWh,
while Q1 base was heard 25 euro cent lower at Eur48.25/MWh.