Prices continue upwards trend on Norwegian outages

LONDON, April 25 - Dutch and British wholesale gas prices continued an upwards trend for the second session in a row due to outages in Norway which reduced pipeline gas supply.

The benchmark front-month contract at the Dutch TTF hub was up 0.42 euro at 29.52 euros per megawatt hour (MWh) at 1001 GMT, LSEG data showed.

The Dutch day-ahead contract was up 0.40 euro at 30.20 euros/MWh.

In the British market, the front-month contract was up 1.00 pence at 73.90 pence per therm

"European gas stocks remain very comfortable. But the current net storage withdrawals probably reinforce the market's idea of maintaining a risk premium in prices," analysts at Engie's EnergyScan said.

Thursday's supply flows from Norway towards continental Europe were down by 4 million cubic meters per day (mcm/d) due to maintenance outages starting at Oseberg and Ormen Lange production fields.

In Britain, supply from Norway was down 26 mcm/d from yesterday.

"The weather has started warming up and total north-west Europe demand is expected down by 770 gigawatt hours per day on the day-ahead. For today and tomorrow the balance is still tight and significant withdrawals from storages are needed," said LSEG gas analyst Saku Jussila.

Europe's gas storage sites are around 61.8% full, according to Gas Infrastructure Europe.

In the European carbon market, the benchmark contract was up 1.04 euro at 66.71 euros per metric ton. (Reporting by Marwa Rashad; Editing by Nina Chestney)