gas-fired electricity generation

Best in Energy – 10 March 2023

U.S. Treasury reassures traders on sanctions ($FT)

Russia’s missiles target Ukraine’s energy networks

India to boost LNG imports for generators ($BBG)

U.S. central bank discovers r* is unreliable indicator

U.S. yield curve inversion and equity values ($WSJ)

U.S. economy and supply-driven inflation ($WSJ)

U.S. inflation fuelled by margin expansion ($BBG)

U.S./EU downplay race on energy subsidies ($FT)

EU eases state aid rules to match U.S. subsidies

(see also European Commission press release)

U.S. railroad safety and trackside sensors ($WSJ)

Yemen’s decaying oil storage tanker to be unloaded

U.S. TREAURY YIELD curve between two-year and ten-year maturities has inverted to around 100 basis points, the most extreme since August 1981, when the economy was entering the second part of the double-dip recession of the early 1980s. The inversion is signalling a sharp fall in interest rates, resulting from a rapid deceleration of inflation, a downturn in the business cycle, or a combination of both:

U.S. GAS INVENTORIES are moving into an increasing surplus, keeping downward pressure on prices. Stocks were +240 billion cubic feet (+13% or +0.58 standard deviations) above the prior ten-year seasonal average on March 3, up from a deficit of -263 billion cubic feet (-8% or -0.98 standard deviations) on January 1, 2023, and a deficit of -427 billion cubic feet (-13% or -1.52 standard deviations) on September 9, 2022:

Best in Energy – 2 March 2023

Global CO₂ emissions hit record high in 2022

India refinery processing hits seasonal record

Latin America accelerates solar deployment

U.S. gas turbines reach record operating rate

Argentina experiences mass blackout

United States explores more China sanctions

Passenger aviation demand stays high ($FT)

U.S. rail freight weakened further in February

China prepares economic team overhaul ($FT)

U.S. MANUFACTURERS reported business activity declined in February for the fourth month running. The ISM composite activity index was 47.7 in February up marginally from 47.4 in January but both readings were in only the 16th percentile for all months since 1980. New orders fell for the sixth month in a row. The new orders sub-index (47.0) was in only the 14th percentile for all months since 1980:

U.S. DISTILLATE inventories were unchanged over the seven days ending on February 24. Stocks were -14 million barrels (-11% or -0.87 standard deviations) below the prior ten-year seasonal average but the deficit has narrowed from -31 million barrels (-22% or -2.5 standard deviations) on October 7:

Best in Energy – 27 January 2023

Freeport LNG takes first steps to restart

EU floats $100 price cap for Russia diesel

Pennsylvania’s transition from coal to gas

India’s electric cars and fuel consumption

China becomes major car exporter ($BBG)

U.S. labour market starts to weaken ($WSJ)

EUROPE’s gas prices continue to slide as traders anticipate a record carry over of inventories at the end of winter 2022/23. Futures prices for deliveries in March 2023 fell to just €55 per megawatt-hour on January 26 from €110 on December 19 and €177 at the start of the winter season on October 3. Prices are falling to encourage more consumption, principally from energy-intensive industrial users and power generators, to ensure there is more storage space left to absorb excess production in summer 2023:

U.S. GROWTH stalled in the fourth quarter of 2022. Real final sales to private domestic purchasers (FSPDP), a measure excluding volatile changes in inventories, trade and government spending, increased at an annualised rate of just +0.2% in the fourth quarter, slowing from +1.1% growth in the third quarter, and +2.6% a year earlier. Real FSPDP advanced at the slowest rate since the first wave of the pandemic in 2020 and before that the recession in 2009.

Business inventories increased rapidly between October and December contributing +1.46 percentage points to reported output growth in the fourth quarter of 2022. Inventory accumulation was probably unplanned as sales were lower than expected. Large inventory changes are normally reversed within one or two quarters. The accumulation during the fourth quarter of 2022 is likely to be followed by efforts at depletion which will make a negative contribution to reported output growth in the first and second quarters of 2023:

Best in Energy – 26 January 2023

Europe’s gas-fired generators reduced output

Indonesia coal exports hit record high in 2022

South Africa’s coal exports slumped last year

U.S. oil output growth set to slow in 2023/24

Microsoft warns about revenue outlook

Higher-earners reduce hours worked ($WSJ)

Tesla discounts vehicles to drive sales ($WSJ)

U.S./Iran nuclear talks near breakdown ($FT)

CHINA’s Lower Yangtze mega-region is being hit by a wave of intense of cold which will drive a significant increase in heating demand, though most factories are closed for the Lunar New Year holiday. Temperatures in Nanjing were more than -6°C below the long-term seasonal average on January 25. So far this winter heating demand (731 HDDs) has been lower than average (789 HDDs). But the recent run of cold weather has trimmed the cumulative deficit in heating demand to -7% down from -11% on January 13:

U.S. PETROLEUM INVENTORIES including the strategic reserve rose +4 million barrels to 1,606 million barrels in the seven days to January 20. But stocks were -170 million barrels below the level a year ago and -304 million barrels below the level before the pandemic in 2019. Commercial crude stocks have increased by +33 million barrels compared with the same point last year. But only because the strategic petroleum reserve has been depleted by -220 million barrels:

Best in Energy – 12 January 2023

PJM says 46 GW of generators failed to respond ¹

U.S. says price cap is cutting Russia’s oil earnings

Global LNG import volumes hit record high

Freeport LNG outage extended to February

French aluminium smelter begins restart

South Africa hit by worst ever power cuts

Freight forwarder cuts employment ($WSJ)

Australia/China coal trade restarts ($WSJ)

Saudi Arabia plans full nuclear fuel cycle

LME’s nickel-market breakdown inquiry

¹ PJM’s post-event study for winter storm Elliot on December 24 is worth reading in full and confirms the major problem was the failure of many generators to respond to instructions from the grid because of a failure to start up or secure enough fuel (principally gas). Generators were unavailable even though they had been given repeated warnings of an extreme weather event for several days beforehand and told to prepare for a plunge in temperatures. In many cases, generators provided less than 1 hour of notice they would not be available. If generators cannot be depended upon to respond to instructions they cannot be considered firm dispatchable power for reliability purposes.

In response, PJM was forced to initiate a series of relatively extreme emergency measures to protect the transmission system, including voltage reductions and an order for flat-out maximum generation from units that were available.

U.S. PETROLEUM INVENTORIES including the strategic reserve totalled 1,599 million barrels on January 6, the lowest seasonal level since 2004. Stocks have fallen by -185 million barrels over the last 12 months and are down by -518 million barrels from their peak in mid-2020 as production has persistently fallen below consumption:

Best in Energy – 4 January 2023

Duke’s insufficient generation during storm ($BBG)¹

China issues more export quotas for fuels

Japan gas suppliers seek overseas resources

India to compensate coal-fired generators

Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund ($WSJ)

U.K. steel makers seek another bailout ($FT)

China/Australia discuss end of coal boycott ($BBG)

¹ Failure of coal and gas-fired generators to start up when instructed by the grid because of instrument and equipment freezes has been a recurrent problem and major cause of power failures during extreme cold weather episodes in the last several decades. Failure to start has meant actual generation available has been much lower than forecast, reducing reserve margins and forcing rotating blackouts to restore margins to safe levels.

THE FUNDAMENTALS of commodity trading have not changed in 2500 years, illustrated by this quote about China’s commodity merchants taken from the Guan Zi, which purports to be a dialogue between Lord Huan of Qi and his powerful chief minister Guan Zhong in the Spring and Autumnperiod (771-481 BCE) but probably a compilation of traditional knowledge written during the Warring States period (481-221 BCE):

“Merchants observe outbreaks of dearth and starvation, scrutinize changes in the fortunes of states, study the patterns of the four seasons, and take notice of what goods are produced in each place. With this knowledge of prices in the marketplace, they gather up their stock of goods, load them on oxcarts and horses, and circulate throughout the four directions. Having reckoned what is abundant and what is scarce and calculated what is precious and what is worthless, they exchange what they possess for what they lack, buying cheap and selling dear … Marvellous and fantastic things arrive in timely fashion; rare and unusual goods readily gather. Day and night thus engaged, merchants tutor their sons and brothers, speaking the language of profit, teaching them the virtue of timeliness, and training them how to recognise the value of goods.”

Guan Zi: Political, Economic and Philosophical Essays from Early China (Rickett, 1985) cited in The Economic History of China: From Antiquity to the Nineteenth Century (von Glahn, 2016)

EUROPE’s gas prices are falling and the futures curve has shifted into contango as inventories remain very high for the time of year and traders no longer anticipate any risk of a shortage before the end of winter 2022/23. The end-of-winter March-April 2023 calendar spread is trading in a contango of more than €1.20/MWh down from a backwardation of €9.70 at the end of September:

Best in Energy – 7 December 2022

G7/Russia oil price cap evolution

China relaxes epidemic controls

India to purchase more gas for power generation

North Carolina’s 3rd day of blackouts after sabotage

Russia/China gas pipeline enters service (trans.)

Russian oil tanker spoofs position signal ($FT)

Russian oil tanker spoofs AIS maritime signals

London’s last great killer smog this week in 1952

BRENT calendar spreads slipped into contango yesterday through May 2023. The combined six-month spread moved into contango for the first time (outside the month-end expiry process when prices and spreads are unrepresentative) for the first time since November 2020, before the first successful coronavirus vaccines were announced:

LONDON is experiencing a period of unusually low temperatures this week, exactly 70 years after similar conditions between December 5 and December 9, 1952, caused the “Great Smog” resulting in 4,000 excess deaths. As temperatures dropped to freezing, domestic and commercial coal combustion surged, sending thousands of tonnes of particulates into the air over the city. A temperature inversion trapped smoke in low-lying areas along the Thames, between the hills surrounding the metropolitan area. For four days and nights, the metropolitan area was blanketed with a suffocating mixture of fog and smoke. The map below shows areas with the worst pollution, which were also the areas with the highest excess mortality:

Best in Energy – 7 November 2022

U.S./Russia communicate to cut escalation risk ($WSJ)

Global LNG prices slide as storage fills ahead of winter

U.S. electricity generators add more gas-fired capacity

G7⁺ price cap for Russian oil to have low impact ($BBG)

German economist sues OPEC for illegal cartel ($BBG)

U.S. shale gas promotes itself as cleaner than coal ($FT)

China’s exports fall as global trade slows ($BBG)

WESTERN EUROPE’s temperatures are expected to be above average for the time of year through December, according to the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasting, which would reduce heating demand and ease pressure on gas and electricity supplies:

U.S. EMPLOYMENT has been growing faster than would have been expected based on output growth alone. The discrepancy between rapid job gains and slower growth in real gross domestic product is evident whether jobs are measured from the employer side (payrolls) or employee side (household surveys). If historical relationships reassert themselves, job gains are likely to slow or output growth will accelerate:

U.S. EMPLOYMENT in the transportation and warehousing super-sector has been flat since June after growing rapidly for two years following the first wave of the pandemic. The number of jobs in the sector has levelled off around 6.5 million up from 5.8 million before the arrival of the pandemic in the first quarter of 2020:

Best in Energy – 6 September 2022

Nuclear generators and service extensions

California calls for electricity conservation

U.S. gas-fired generation hits record high

Economic warfare and energy bills ($FT)

Energy crisis myths dispelled by IEA ($FT)

EU smelters close on high energy costs ($FT)

EU/UK POLICYMAKERS are considering how to protect households and businesses from surging gas and electricity prices. History suggests there are four basic options that can be employed singly or in combination. Multiple refinements are possible with each option – but the four basic responses have been the same since at least 400 BCE:

EUROZONE manufacturers reported business activity declined for the second month running in August. The composite purchasing managers’ index slipped to 49.6 in August from 49.8 in July and 52.1 in June as the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, record gas and power prices, broader inflation, and falling household and business confidence tipped the regional economy towards recession:

HEDGE FUND and other money manager positions in the six major petroleum futures and options contracts on August 30:

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