UK Energy Market Report - 26 August 2026

Every NBP contract and every UK baseload forward settled lower on 25 August, the gas near curve shedding 4p to 5p a therm, while day-ahead power went the other way and rose 6.6% and Brent had its largest fall of this run.

Tuesday took the whole gas board back down and most of the power board with it, but the electricity prompt went the other way.

Every NBP contract fell, the near curve by 4p to 5p a therm. Every UK baseload forward fell too. Day-ahead baseload rose 6.6% and the peak block 12.1%, and Brent had its largest fall of this run.

Gas Market

NBP Day-Ahead settled at 161.40p on 25 August, down 4.75p or 2.9%, ending a run of two consecutive rises and coming off Monday’s multi-year high.

Every contract on the board fell with it. Sep-26 lost 5.09p to 163.11p, the largest move on the board, with Oct-26 down 5.04p to 164.13p and Nov-26 4.63p to 167.88p.

Q4-26 gave back 4.74p to 167.26p, Winter-26 4.41p to 165.35p and Q1-27 4.07p to 163.40p. Those are falls of 2.4% to 2.8%, against 2.9% on the prompt, so this was close to a parallel shift rather than a repricing.

The carry came back. At 163.11p the front month now sits 1.71p above the day-ahead, against 2.05p above on Monday and 1.42p below it on Friday. Three sessions, three different shapes at the front of this curve.

Further out the front-loading eased for the first time in this run. Q4-26 at 167.26p is 3.86p above Q1-27 at 163.40p, narrower than Monday’s 4.53p.

Britain stayed the cheapest hub in Europe. NBP settled 161.40p against TTF at 166.36p, widening the discount marginally to 4.96p from 4.88p, with PVB at 165.77p, PEG 166.31p, THE 167.35p, Austrian VTP 170.20p and PSV 174.88p.

Supply is the reason, and it is a September story. TotalEnergies reports Gassco confirming Troll capacity rises to 132.2 mcm/day from 3 September, taking total Norwegian network capacity to 393 mcm/day when fully operational.

Norwegian flows to Europe eased to 338.5 mcm/day on 25 August from 343.8, with exports to Britain at 79.1 mcm/day on TotalEnergies’ read. The 07:00 table this morning is stamped later and lower: Langeled down 7.50 to 59.40 and Vesterled and Flags up 1.00 to 13.00, so 72.40 mcm/day from Norway against 78.90.

Domestic supply covered it. UKCS production rose 4.50 to 91.70 mcm/day, demand fell 6.96 to 138.79 and linepack built 7.18 to 356.91 mcm. LNG sendout moved for the first time in seven sessions, up 0.90 to 9.00 on South Hook, while 49.83 mcm/day still left through IUK and BBL.

Two dates matter more than any of that. Cygnus maintenance starts on 31 August and IUK maintenance on 1 September, cutting export capacity into Europe, which keeps gas in Britain and pushes the prompt balance the wrong way for anyone holding length.

One correction to the commentary. TotalEnergies describes gas and power markets as softening on 25 August; that is true of gas everywhere and of every power forward, but UK day-ahead baseload rose 6.6% and the peak block 12.1%.

At the 09:26 stamp this morning the whole near board is marked lower again. Day-Ahead is indicated 156.90p, Sep-26 157.90p, Q4-26 162.27p and Winter-26 160.90p, all 4p to 5p under settlement, while Summer-28 is marked 3.31p higher at 76.00p.

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

Electricity Market

UK day-ahead baseload settled at 140.18 £/MWh on 25 August, up 8.71 or 6.6%. Day-ahead peak rose further, up 14.61 or 12.1% to 134.91 £/MWh.

The summer inversion halved again. The peak block is 5.27 £/MWh below baseload, against 11.17 on Monday and 21.78 on Friday.

Every forward went the other way. Nov-26 lost 4.60 to 139.28 £/MWh, Q4-26 4.21 to 135.08, Oct-26 4.13 to 128.49, Winter-26 3.27 to 135.23 and Q1-27 2.31 to 135.38. Sep-26 fell least at 1.29 to 129.52.

That last pair is the structural change. Q1-27 at 135.38 now settles above Q4-26 at 135.08, having sat 1.59 below it on Monday. Gas kept its Q4-over-Q1 shape at 3.86p; power flipped its own by 0.30. The two fuels are no longer telling the same story about which quarter is tight.

The morning price index missed in the other direction from Monday. Yesterday’s report carried gas Day-Ahead indicated at 166.06p and it settled 161.40p, out 4.66, with Sep-26 marked 167.32p against 163.11p and Q4-26 171.23p against 167.26p, out 4.21 and 3.97, all three over on a day the market fell.

The far end was worse, and we flagged it at the time. Summer-27 was marked 113.00p and settled 105.92p, out 7.08, with Winter-27 marked 110.00p against 103.13p, out 6.87. Quote an indication with its timestamp and build nothing on which way it points.

The part-day system price row taught a sharper lesson than usual. Yesterday’s report published 98.00 to 180.00 for 25 August and noted that both prints, at 01:18 and 08:19, pre-dated the 09:32 stamp, so both were settled fact for the eight hours elapsed.

They were. They were also both beaten. The day closed 76.05 to 238.00, the minimum printing at 12:18 and the maximum at 15:18, so the floor came out 21.95 lower and the ceiling 58.00 higher. A pre-stamp print is a running extreme, not a final one, and a running extreme can only move one way.

That 238.00 maximum is the highest of this run, against 200.00 on Monday and 204.80 on Sunday. Today so far reads 88.55 to 214.00, stamped at 03:19 and 07:18, with the same warning.

The nuclear stack thinned again overnight. Heysham 2 reactor 7 came off this morning for 315 MW and Hartlepool 2 went back off on 25 August for 195 MW and twelve days, having only just returned. With Hartlepool 1 at a full 620 MW since May, Heysham 1 reactor 2 at 205 MW and Heysham 1 reactor 1 at 168 MW, that is 1,503 MW of impact across five units.

September is where it stacks up. Heysham 1 reactor 1 goes to a full 610 MW outage on 31 August, Heysham 2 reactor 8 takes 660 MW off on 4 September for 80 days, Torness 1 640 MW on 6 September and Hartlepool 2 a full 620 MW on 7 September. That is 2,530 MW of complete outages landing inside eight days, in the quarter power forwards have just marked down.

Wind is the near-term swing and it is timed badly. Forecast wind and solar output is near 12,050 MWh today, falls to a trough around 7,950 MWh on 28 August, roughly 1,800 under the seasonal norm of about 9,750, then recovers above 12,300 MWh by 31 August.

Oil, Carbon and Global Commodities

Brent M+1 settled at 88.58 $/barrel on 25 August, down 3.59 or 3.9%, the largest fall of this run and the first close below 90 since it began.

TotalEnergies puts it down to geopolitical risk premium unwinding, the same premium that carried Brent through five consecutive rises to 94.39 last Friday.

Coal API2 for Cal-27 lost 2.53 to $126.99/tonne, a fall of 2.0%.

Carbon was the only part of this table to rise, EUA Dec-26 up 0.62 to €84.42 and UK ETS Dec-26 up 0.38 to £60.96.

At Tuesday’s 1.1689 sterling rate the European allowance is worth about £72.22, putting the UK scheme £11.26 a tonne below its European equivalent against £11.11 on Monday, so the discount UK obligation holders buy into widened again.

In LNG, JKM front month eased 0.19 to $23.32/MMBtu while TTF spot fell 0.64 to $22.68 and NBP spot 0.62 to $22.03. The JKM premium over TTF widened sharply to 0.64 $/MMBtu from 0.19, which is Asia holding its bid while Europe sold off.

Henry Hub lost 4.6% to $2.70, so British gas now costs 8.2 times American gas at the same moment. Sterling was steady at 1.1689 and 1.3649.

Commodity	Price	Change (day)
Brent Crude (M+1)	$88.58/barrel	-3.9%
Coal API2 (Cal-27)	$126.99/tonne	-2.0%
EUA Carbon (Dec-26)	€84.42/tonne	+0.7%
UK ETS (Dec-26)	£60.96/tonne	+0.6%
JKM LNG (front-month)	$23.32/MMBtu	-0.8%
TTF Gas (spot)	$22.68/MMBtu	-2.7%

Storage and Supply Outlook

TotalEnergies puts European storage at roughly 62% full and names it as the reason the forward curve stays elevated even on a day the whole board fell.

At country level Britain gained three points to 46% and is no longer the emptiest on the map. Italy sits at 80%, Spain 73%, France 65%, Germany 50%, and the Benelux pair at 48% and 43%.

The site picture improved across the board. Stublach added four points to 75%, Aldbrough five to 43%, Holford three to 71%, with Holehouse Farm at 70%, Hornsea 51% and Hill Top 24%.

The LNG tanks were the exception, South Hook easing a point to 59%, Isle of Grain holding at 32% and Dragon at 33%. Rough and Humbly Grove are still at zero.

The arrivals schedule into North West Europe carries ten cargoes and 990 mcm out to 31 August. Six are American and account for 604 mcm, two are Norwegian, one Nigerian into Dunkirk and one Russian into Montoir on 31 August.

Only one is British. Milford Haven takes 96 mcm from the United States today, the sole UK arrival on the schedule.

On weather, UK temperatures run above the seasonal mean to 30 August, near 19.4C today and easing to about 17C, then fall to the mean near 15.2C on 31 August and 1 September. TotalEnergies expects above-seasonal temperatures to hold through early October.

What This Means for Your Business

Q4-26 gas closed on 7 August at 139.23p and settled Tuesday at 167.26p. That is 28.03p a therm in twelve trading sessions, worth roughly £9,564 a year on a 1 GWh gas load, and yesterday’s single session took £1,617 of that back.

Winter-26 power has added 10.46 £/MWh since 13 August, worth about £10,460 a year on a 1 GWh electricity load.

The shape matters more than the level, and it is a timing point. A business whose gas contract starts in April is looking at Summer-27 gas at 105.92p; one starting in October is looking at 167.26p for the same commodity, and 61p a therm of that gap is calendar rather than commodity.

The winter premium narrowed for the first time in this run, to 59.43p a therm from 62.10p, which is the case for knowing exactly where a gas renewal date sits against this curve before deciding when to fix any of it.

For electricity the prompt and the curve are now arguing openly. Day-ahead baseload rose 6.6% on a session when every forward fell, and yesterday’s balancing market put 161.95 £/MWh between the cheapest and dearest half hours of one day. That gap is what a contract structure and a half-hourly profile have to absorb.

The far end still looks like a different market. Summer-28 gas at 72.69p is 44.0% of Winter-26 at 165.35p, so cover for 2028 is priced on a completely different set of assumptions from cover for this winter.

The watch list is all September and all of it lands in the quarter that just repriced. Cygnus maintenance starts on 31 August, IUK maintenance on 1 September, Troll capacity rises on 3 September, Heysham 2 reactor 8 takes 660 MW off on 4 September, and Britain goes into the autumn 46% full.

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 – 25 August 2026