According to AleaSoft Energy Forecasting, in the third week of May, prices in most major European electricity markets registered an upward trend between Tuesday, May 14, and Friday, May 17, reaching the highest daily price of the week on that day. However, this peak was lower than the previous week’s peak. Despite the aforementioned upward trend, weekly prices fell compared to the previous week. The exceptions were the N2EX market of the United Kingdom and the IPEX market of Italy, with increases of 0.2% and 5.8%, respectively. The Nord Pool market of the Nordic countries reached the largest percentage price decline, 67%.
In contrast, the EPEX SPOT market of Belgium registered the smallest percentage decline, 6.9%. In the other markets analyzed at AleaSoft Energy Forecasting, prices fell between 11% in the EPEX SPOT market of the Netherlands and the MIBEL market of Spain and 27% in the EPEX SPOT market of Germany.
In the third week of May, weekly averages were below €50/MWh in most analyzed European electricity markets. The exceptions were the Dutch, British and Italian markets, with averages of €55.80/MWh, €81.80/MWh and €96.12/MWh, respectively. In contrast, the Nordic market registered the lowest weekly average, €13.18/MWh. In the rest of the analyzed markets, prices ranged from €23.68/MWh in the French market to €49.13/MWh in the German market.
Regarding hourly prices, most analyzed European markets registered negative prices on May 14 and 19. The exceptions were the British and Italian markets, which had no negative prices in the third week of May.
On the other hand, the German, Belgian, French, Dutch and Nordic markets also had negative prices on May 18 and the first four markets on this list, on May 13. In addition, the Dutch market registered negative prices on May 15, while the German and Nordic markets had negative prices on May 15 and 16. In the third week of May, the Dutch market registered the lowest hourly price again, €80.00/MWh, on Sunday, May 19, from 13:00 to 14:00.
During the week of May 13, the fall in the average price of gas and CO2 emission allowances and the increase in wind energy production in most analyzed markets had a downward influence on European electricity market prices. However, in the Italian market, wind and solar energy production fell, contributing to the price increase in this market.
AleaSoft Energy Forecasting’s price forecasts indicate that prices in some European electricity markets, such as Germany, Spain, the Netherlands or Portugal, might increase in the fourth week of May, influenced by the decrease in wind energy production. In the rest of the markets, prices will be slightly lower than the previous week, AleaSoft Energy Forecasting.