LONDON, July 30 (Reuters) - British wholesale gas prices
were mostly down on Friday morning as prices corrected gains
over the past week and Norwegian imports increased.
* The day-ahead contract was 0.90 pence lower at
104.10 pence per therm by 0824 GMT, having reached its highest
level since March 2018 on Thursday.
* The August contract declined by 0.60 pence to
104.00 p/therm.
* "There is some correction on the prompt and supply has
gone up,"
a gas trader said.
* The system was around 14 million cubic metres (mcm)
over-supplied, with demand forecast at 143 mcm and supply at 157
mcm/day, National Grid data showed.
* Norwegian imports have increased with Langeled pipeline
flows up
by 10 mcm at 50 mcm/day.
* More supply is expected next week if planned outages,
particularly in Britain, end as scheduled.
* Wind power generation is expected to fall over the weekend
and
early next week before rising again from the middle of next
week.
* Refinitiv analysts forecast an increase of gas-for-power
demand
for the day ahead of 16 mcm.
* Consultancy Energy Aspects said it has increased its
expectations of Chinese liquefied natural gas (LNG) demand this
summer due to an uptick in industrial demand but also hot
weather in north-east Asia.
* "There is still also ample incentive for Asian firms to
take
their LNG supply well ahead of winter, given the risks of
another run-up in Asian spot prices like last January," the
consultancy said.
* "Threats to Europe’s LNG receipts over the coming months
mean
that TTF near-curve price risks are mainly to the upside."
* "But the key tension is between how much European firms
will
hedge their winter supply by locking away in storage now and how
much firms are willing to wait until winter and the assumed
start-up of Nord Stream 2," it added.
* The August price at the Dutch TTF hub was
0.80 euro
lower at 40.40 euros per megawatt hour.
* The benchmark Dec-21 EU carbon contract was down
by
0.78 euro at 53.27 euros a tonne.
* The benchmark Dec-21 British carbon contract was
0.56
pound lower at 43.41 pounds per tonne.
(Reporting by Nina Chestney)