UK Energy Market Report - 1 September 2026

Friday’s settlement board fell right across the near curve, and then this morning’s index reopened every NBP contract higher, day-ahead gas by 11.60p, after a bank holiday weekend of Norwegian maintenance.

Gas Market

NBP Day-Ahead settled at 162.10p on 28 August, down 4.40p or 2.6%, handing back most of Thursday’s 6.00p gain.

The near curve went with it. Q1-27 fell furthest at 4.05p to 163.27p, with Dec-26 down 4.00p to 169.38p, Winter-26 3.93p to 165.34p, Q4-26 3.81p to 167.36p, Nov-26 3.76p to 167.89p and Oct-26 3.67p to 164.82p, a band of 2.2% to 2.4%.

The far curve went the other way for a second session. Winter-27 rose 0.60p to 106.19p, Winter-28 0.48p to 81.11p and Summer-28 0.42p to 73.89p, while Summer-27 was flat at 109.06p.

The front month rolled. Sep-26 has dropped off the board and Oct-26 leads it at 164.82p, 2.72p above the day-ahead. That is not comparable with Thursday’s 0.39p carry, which was measured on a different contract.

Q4-26 widened its lead over Q1-27 to 4.09p from 3.85p, so the front of winter stays the tight part of the board.

Britain stayed the cheapest hub in Europe on an almost unchanged margin, NBP at 162.10p against TTF at 166.53p, a 4.43p discount against 4.39p, with PEG at 166.92p and PSV dearest at 175.23p.

Then the weekend happened. This morning’s 09:33 index marks Day-Ahead at 173.70p, 11.60p or 7.2% above Friday’s settlement, with Q1-27 marked 11.80p higher, Winter-26 11.17p, Q4-26 10.84p and Oct-26 10.52p. Even the far curve is marked 5.91p to 6.95p up.

The reason is Norwegian. TotalEnergies reports maintenance stepping up over the bank holiday weekend, including work at Kollsnes that has taken around 40 mcm/day out, with flows to Britain through Langeled down 26 mcm/day on that and Langeled’s own capacity restrictions.

Gassco had flagged the shape of it. Norwegian Continental Shelf nominations totalled 322.4 mcm/day on 28 August, with planned outages scheduled to climb from 40.14 mcm/day that day to 71.14 on 29 August and 77.14 on 30 August.

The 07:00 flow table flatters that, because it compares this morning with Monday rather than with Friday. Langeled is nominated at 22.20 mcm/day, 5.10 above Monday but far below the 51.10 it carried on Thursday.

Britain covered it by shedding demand and stopping an export. Demand fell 11.82 to 103.12 mcm/day, IUK exports to Belgium stopped entirely from 33.50 mcm/day to zero, and linepack rose 5.82 to 335.60 mcm with the system opening 8 mcm/day long.

LNG sendout is flat at 8.10 mcm/day and UKCS production steady at 84.10.

The card below summarises where NBP contracts settled on Friday against the previous session.

Electricity Market

UK day-ahead baseload settled at 130.50 £/MWh on 28 August, down 8.40 or 6.1%, several times the 1.70 it had lost on Thursday.

Peak went the other way, up 7.02 or 5.2% to 143.08 £/MWh. That leaves peak 12.58 above baseload, having closed 2.84 below it on Thursday and 2.41 above on Wednesday, the second reversal in as many sessions.

The forwards all fell inside a narrow band of 1.4% to 2.1%. Dec-26 lost 3.01 to 138.28 £/MWh, Nov-26 2.71 to 138.97, Winter-26 2.59 to 135.08, Q4-26 2.49 to 135.51 and Oct-26 1.78 to 129.38.

Power rolled its front month too, and the roll is worth a look. Oct-26 at 129.38 £/MWh sits 1.12 below the day-ahead and 9.59 below Nov-26, so the board prices October as the cheapest month on it.

Now to own Friday’s index. It marked Oct-26 baseload at 144.51 £/MWh and the contract settled 129.38, out 15.13. That is larger than any miss this report has scored on either board; the previous worst was 11.47p on Winter-28 gas. This report published that mark as a direction rather than a price, and it was not even that: it pointed up 13.35 and the contract closed down 1.78. Day-Ahead was marked 129.50 and settled 130.50, out 1.00 the other way.

The same caution applies this morning. Day-Ahead and Oct-26 are both marked at a flat 140.00 £/MWh, round numbers on holiday liquidity, while every other contract on the board is marked between 1.10 and 5.40 higher.

The part-day system price warning scored differently this time. This report published 110.20 to 214.00 for 28 August and said both prints could only widen. The maximum held exactly, 214.00 at 06:14; the minimum fell to 80.65 at 22:44, 29.55 lower and sixteen hours later.

That is the first time in four scored sessions that the minimum has been the side that moved. The bank holiday itself ran 60.20 to 225.00, a 164.80 £/MWh spread and the widest of the five days shown. Today so far reads 76.01 to 191.90, stamped 07:18 and 07:48, same warning.

Nuclear tightened over the weekend. The outage board lists 1,945 MW of impact across five units against 1,503 MW on Thursday, the addition being Heysham 1 reactor 1 going fully off from 31 August for a listed 17 days.

Hartlepool 1 has been fully off since 27 May, and the 91-day duration listed against it expired on 26 August without the unit returning.

Another 1,920 MW is scheduled between 4 and 7 September: Heysham 2 reactor 8 for 660 MW, Torness 1 for 640 MW and Hartlepool 2 for 620 MW, all full-unit outages.

Wind is the offset and it arrives late. The forecast puts wind and solar near 10,200 MWh today and about 8,400 tomorrow against a seasonal norm near 9,900, then roughly 14,400 MWh on 3 and 4 September. August wind averaged about 6.5 GW, the lowest month of 2026.

Oil, Carbon and Global Commodities

Brent M+1 settled at 88.10 $/barrel on 28 August, down 1.60 or 1.8%, back below 89 after one session above it.

It has since turned, with TotalEnergies reporting oil higher this morning on renewed fighting between the United States and Iran.

Coal API2 for Cal-27 rose 0.71 to $129.71/tonne, a 0.6% gain.

Carbon rose on both sides. EUA Dec-26 added 0.31 to €82.73 and UK ETS Dec-26 0.39 to £59.39, gains of 0.4% and 0.7% on a day gas fell 2.6%.

At Friday’s 1.1666 sterling rate the European allowance is worth about £70.92, putting the UK scheme £11.53 a tonne below its European equivalent against £11.67 on Thursday, so the discount narrowed slightly.

In LNG, JKM front month eased to $23.18/MMBtu from 23.41, TTF spot to 22.62 from 23.21 and NBP spot to 21.94 from 22.63. The JKM premium over TTF widened to 0.56 $/MMBtu from 0.20, reversing two sessions of narrowing.

Henry Hub fell 2.4% to $2.82, leaving British gas at 7.8 times the American price at the same moment, against 7.8 on Thursday. Sterling firmed a shade to 1.1666 against the euro and eased to 1.3534 against the dollar.

Commodity	Price	Change (day)
Brent Crude (M+1)	$88.10/barrel	-1.8%
Coal API2 (Cal-27)	$129.71/tonne	+0.6%
EUA Carbon (Dec-26)	€82.73/tonne	+0.4%
UK ETS (Dec-26)	£59.39/tonne	+0.7%
JKM LNG (front-month)	$23.18/MMBtu	-1.0%
TTF Gas (spot)	$22.62/MMBtu	-2.5%

Storage and Supply Outlook

TotalEnergies puts European storage at roughly 64% full, well below the level seen at this point in both 2024 and 2025, which is the standing reason the curve holds a winter premium on days the prompt is quiet.

Britain did not move. The country map holds Britain at 49% across the four days since Thursday, while France gained four points to 69%, Belgium five to 53%, the Netherlands three to 46%, Germany two to 52% and Italy two to 82%. Spain is unchanged at 73%.

Britain is bottom of that map with around nine weeks of injection season left, and the only one of the seven that stood still over a long weekend.

At site level Stublach holds 77%, Holford 75%, South Hook 71%, Holehouse Farm 70%, Hornsea 56%, Aldbrough 55%, Dragon 33%, Isle of Grain 29% and Hill Top 16%. Rough and Humbly Grove remain at zero.

Two of those are worth flagging. Holehouse Farm has now held 70% for a second reading, which settles the 42-point jump this report queried on Thursday as a restatement rather than an injection. South Hook gained 14 points to 71%, the only large move on the board, and it is an LNG terminal rather than a seasonal store.

The arrivals schedule into North West Europe carries ten cargoes and 967 mcm between 2 and 7 September. Eight are American and account for 761 mcm, with one Nigerian into Fos and one Russian into Montoir on 6 September. None is British.

On weather, UK temperatures run above the seasonal mean across the whole eight-day forecast but narrowly, near 16.1C today against a mean of about 15.3C and peaking near 17.4C on 4 September.

What This Means for Your Business

Q4-26 gas closed on 7 August at 139.23p and settled Friday at 167.36p. That is 28.13p a therm, worth roughly £9,598 a year on a 1 GWh gas load, and this morning’s index marks it 10.84p higher again.

If that mark holds, Q4-26 stands 38.97p above where it was on 7 August, about £13,297 a year on the same load. The whole of that second leg arrived across a weekend nobody could trade.

Which is the argument for splitting a renewal across several purchase dates rather than one. A single fixing date is partly a bet on which side of a bank holiday you land.

The shape still matters more than the level. A business whose gas year starts in April is looking at Summer-27 at 109.06p; one starting in October is looking at 167.36p for the same commodity, and that 56.28p gap is calendar rather than commodity, worth about £19,204 a year on 1 GWh.

It narrowed 3.81p on Friday, the first real narrowing in a week, but this morning marks the near curve up roughly twice as far as the far curve, which would widen it straight back out.

What is driving it is Norwegian availability rather than anything domestic. Kollsnes and Langeled took roughly 40 and 26 mcm/day out over a weekend, and an 11.60p day-ahead gap-up followed.

On electricity the prompt fell 6.1% while peak rose 5.2% on the same day. None of that reaches a headline unit rate; it lands on the half-hourly profile, which is where a site running plant through the evening peak feels it.

The far end remains a different market. Summer-28 gas at 73.89p is 44.7% of Winter-26 at 165.34p, and Summer-28 power at 67.23 is 49.8% of Winter-26 at 135.08, so cover for 2028 is priced on assumptions that have little to do with this winter.

The watch list is short. Norwegian maintenance is the live one, Heysham 2 reactor 8 takes 660 MW off on 4 September, and Britain enters September 49% full and not filling.

For a view tailored to your consumption profile and renewal window, speak to one of our energy consultants today.

Previous report: UK Energy Market Report – 28 August 2026