The Monday after the Friday before, and what the UK electorate’s decision for Brexit means is still unclear. If anything, it seems more unclear now than on Friday morning, when the shock of the result made it seem like the exit would be swift. That seems unlikely now. One of the more interesting questions (for […]
Energy Connections
Squaring the circle of Nord Stream 2
The planned Nord Stream extension continues to generate vigorous debate, showing the difficulty of marrying aims of cost-effectiveness, social benefit and political acceptability. A project of Russia’s Gazprom in partnership with a handful of Europe-based energy majors, Nord Stream 2 would double the existing gas supply pipeline’s capacity of 55bcm/year by 2019. It would also […]
Stricter energy market abuse rules to apply from 3 July
In less than one month, energy trading across all European countries will be subject to stricter trading rules, as the Market Abuse Regulation (MAR) and the directive on criminal sanctions for market abuse come into force. From 3 July, the two pieces of legislation will strengthen the current anti-abuse framework and widen its scope. The rules aim to prohibit insider dealing and market manipulation, and […]
Advice for politicians touting security of supply: be practical
A common theme was bandied about the stage at Gas Infrastructure Europe’s annual conference in Sofia last week: security and diversification of supply. But conference goers are seemingly tired of what they are terming political idealisms. The speaker line-up on day one of the conference was impressive. Bulgarian prime minister Boyko Borissov stole the limelight […]
No North Sea, no problem
The dramatic decline of oil prices over the past couple of years has led to the re-evaluation of investments into UK North Sea oil and gas production. Potentially untapped resources that remain on the British continental shelf are in areas of more challenging geographies and environments. Even before the commodity crash, many were anticipating a […]
An easing of the financial burden, perhaps
Energy traders, generally, have been arguing their case for why they should not be regulated under the second markets in financial instruments directive (MiFID II) for some time now. What has been given less attention is some of the consequences of other, related legislation. For example, a firm supervised under MiFID II will instantly have […]
LNG in the Med and topsy-turvy price trends
Observers of the French and Spanish gas markets over the last few months cannot have failed to note a mounting challenge to the traditional price structure in the region. LNG – both in terms of quantity and price – has played an important role in the recent shift. While historically Spanish AOC hub prices have […]
Commission’s about-turn reassures gas shippers
The European Commission’s latest update to EU gas capacity allocation mechanism laws is an encouraging sign for market participants tired of law-makers introducing potentially market-changing rules without understanding their impact. The commission slipped in an unexpected and unwelcome surprise for market participants when it circulated a new draft of a network code for gas markets […]
Part economics, part politics – the role of LNG in Europe
The flood of LNG into Europe, expected by many commentators, has yet to appear. But deliveries are likely to be higher this year than in 2015, and if demand fails to rise in east Asia in the mid-term, Europe could see a big jump in deliveries later in the decade. Perhaps more relevant for now […]
Wire we waiting?
In an event that went largely unnoticed save for a select handful of expert news services – ICIS included of course – Europe’s largest electricity market, Germany, supplied all of its power from renewable sources for a brief hour-long window on Sunday 15 May. This was a milestone of epic proportions, and one worth putting […]