The price of European natural gas has risen above 100 euros per megawatt-hour for the first time since December 2022. The front-month contract at the Dutch TTF hub, a key benchmark for the European market, reached 100.37 euros per megawatt-hour at 4 p.m. Central European Time on October 28. The daily increase exceeded 4 percent.
The rise followed a warning from Energy Commissioner Dan Jorgensen. “Once again, because of geopolitical turbulence, Europe is facing a new energy crisis,” he told journalists in Brussels. He said the coming winter would be difficult for European citizens and the economy, adding that fuel bills in the European Union were “rising sharply.”
EU gas storage facilities were 75 percent full as of October 21, according to data from the Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators, ACER. That is below the usual target of 90 percent for November 1, although member states are allowed to apply the target more flexibly. At the end of the previous winter, reserves stood at only 28 percent, compared with a nine-year average of about 40 percent.
Refilling the storage facilities has been slow and expensive. ACER estimates that the war increased Europe’s gas import bill by between 18 billion and 33 billion euros. Additional pressure has come from disruptions to liquefied natural gas supplies linked to the war with Iran.
Almost no Qatari LNG reached the European Union during the summer. This increased the bloc’s dependence on supplies from the United States, which now provide about 30 percent of its gas.
During the winter, the European Union will have to compete with Asian buyers for available LNG cargoes. ACER says this could lead to further sharp price fluctuations. The risk is partly reduced by lower consumption: European gas demand is about 20 percent below its level before the 2022 crisis, allowing existing reserves to last longer.
The TTF price remains well below the record of about 340 euros per megawatt-hour reached in August 2022. It is nevertheless considerably higher than the level of approximately 32 euros before the start of the war with Iran.
The European Commission expects the global diesel market to remain tight through 2027 and wants to increase production at European refineries. About one quarter of the bloc’s refineries have closed over the past two decades.
As a possible alternative, the European Union and Canada are discussing a long-term agreement on LNG supplies. A meeting of the member states’ energy ministers is scheduled for Thursday, where risks to supplies during the winter are expected to be discussed.
Source: fakti.bg
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7665 | 29 Oct. 2026 | 09:31
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