‘Beast from the East’ leads to jump in energy prices

Energy prices jumped last month due to the impact of the “Beast from the East” which brought freezing temperatures and record demand.

The Bord Gáis Energy Index, which tracks wholesale energy prices, shows costs increased 4 per cent in February, with the impact from the bad weather exacerbated by supply outages and disruptions that led within-day gas prices to multi-year highs.

Gas prices rose 7 per cent during the month, while electricity prices were up 14 per cent.

The National Balancing Point (NBP) day-ahead contract, the price for gas delivered tomorrow, averaged 54.54 pence a therm (p/th) in February versus the January average of 50.38p/th and up over 3p above the comparable period last year.

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Gas demand in the UK hit a six-year high on February 28th, and the rush to secure supplies saw within-day gas price soar to a 12 year high of £1.90 on that day.

Excluding supplier capacity payments, the average wholesale price for electricity in February was €57.86 megawatt hours (MWh) compared to €50.65/MWh in January, an increase of €7.21/MWh.