France Rises at a Quicker Pace on Nuclear, Low Wind

The German and French day-ahead baseload contracts rose on the day, with a sharper price increase recorded in France amid unplanned outages at nuclear units owing to high river temperatures, while strong PV in Germany kept gains due to low wind limited – leading to some delivery hours turning negative.

• The German day-ahead spot settled at €77.24/MWh from €71.62/MWh on the previous day.
  
• The French day-ahead spot cleared at €52.83/MWh from €31.63/MWh on the previous day.
• The hourly prices in Germany reached as high as €177.13/MWh for hour 20-21, slightly down from €178.07/MWh for the same hour on 29 July.
• Negative prices were done for hours 13-14 and 14-15 at between minus €0.04/MWh and minus €0.06/MWh. In comparison, hourly prices in France were between €0.04/MWh and €109.53/MWh from €0.00-93.66/MWh. German wind is only expected at 1.5GW, or a 2% load factor, on 30 July and will slightly increase to 4% load factors over 31 July – 1 August – likely keeping upward pressure on delivery costs amid rising demand.
• In contrast, German peak load solar output is expected at a 38% load factor or 32.93GW on 30 July before dropping slightly to a 32% load factor the next day.
• German power demand is anticipated to rise to around 51.6GW on 30 July, up from 50.6GW forecast for today. Demand will then slightly increase to around 52GW the next day.
• In France, wind forecast points to output at 1.59GW, or an 8% load factor, on 30 July, with wind on 31 July at a 9% load factor– possibly continuing to place France at a discount to Germany.
• French nuclear availability was at 75% of capacity as of Monday morning, down from 76% on 26 July, RTE data showed, cited by Bloomberg.
• But EdF may reduce nuclear production at the 2.6GW Golfech nuclear power plant from 30 July until 7 August due to high temperatures forecast on the Garonne river, remit data showed.
• The firm will also start saving fuel at the 1.5GW Chooz 2 reactor equivalent to 106 days of full load operations starting Monday until the next refueling outage planned on 31 January 2026.