Market indicators for Western Europe – week 45 (Thurday update)

Eylert Ellefsen

The available nuclear capacity in France was very low at the end of Q4 last year, whilst outlooks for Q1-2022 were also lower than normal by the end of 2021. Around this time, we published a blog post focusing on the low availability during February, which could mean a strained supply situation in a cold-weather scenario. This was reflected in very strong forward prices for Q1-months during December as markets included strong risk premiums in case of a cold spell.

Eylert Ellefsen

The German nuclear and coal exits since 2020 have had a strong influence on the country’s production fleet. In order to identify and illustrate the changes in power generation sources within the last 2 years, EQ has studied the German January power balances for 2020, 2021, and 2022. Initially, we have updated both the exit and capacity plans for the nuclear, as well as the coal-fleet as an introduction to the power balance and production numbers.

Eylert Ellefsen

Electricity generated by hydropower across the Alp region (France, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, and Germany) has an average annual net production of about 187 TWh - covering approximately 14% of total consumption in the area. Of these countries, France has the highest hydropower output at 59 TWh net, while Switzerland and Austria at about 35 TWh are what we would consider as the most typical hydropower areas – which cover about 50% of their consumption from hydropower. This blog post from EQ contains a short review of the hydropower conditions for 2021, as well as a view of the current situation and hydrological balance.