Combined Finnish and Baltic gas demand in September was the highest of any month since April, as stronger gas-fired power generation continued driving consumption in Latvia and Finland.
Combined demand in Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania last month rose to 2.61TWh from 2.49TWh in August, although it was still lower than 2.77TWh a year earlier and even further below the average of roughly 4.3TWh in 2018-21 (see graph, data and download). This was a fourth consecutive monthly increase after demand hit a near two-year low in May. Demand increasing in May-September is an unusual pattern, as pre-2022 consumption in the region tended to decline over the summer.
The power sector continued to drive regional demand, with gas-fired output across the four countries totalling 220GWh in September, just below April's 228GWh and well above other summer months, data from research institute Fraunhofer ISE show (see gas-fired output graph). The call on gas-fired assets strengthened because of Finnish nuclear outages. The 507MW unit 1 at Loviisa has been off line since 31 August, and the latest update from the operator said it would not return until 9 October, a date that has already been delayed several times. The 890MW unit 2 at Olkiluoto was also unavailable, on 9 September-6 October, while output from the 1.6GW unit 3 at Olkiluoto was limited. Lower nuclear generation in Finland, which normally exports to the Baltics, spurred demand for gas-fired generation.
The Inkoo LNG terminal underwent short-term works, which took it off line on the 18-19 September gas days, but sendout held at zero on 18-22 September. During that time, Finland switched to net imports of 32 GWh/d from Estonia through the Balticconnector from net exports of 9 GWh/d earlier in that month and 50 GWh/d in all of August. The large gap between LNG deliveries on 28 August and 21 September was probably the reason for the low sendout in the first three weeks of that month (see data and download), although Inkoo sendout was weak even before the maintenance, averaging 40 GWh/d compared with 79 GWh/d in August.
Lower southbound flows from Finland cut into injections at Latvia's Incukalns facility, which fell to zero on the 18-22 September gas days before rebounding as Inkoo sendout increased. Stocks at Incukalns ended the month at about 19.3TWh, holding below the 20.9TWh of a year earlier but well above the five-year average of 16.1TWh in 2017-21.
Prices on the regional GET Baltic exchange averaged €40.37/MWh in September, down by 5pc on the month and 4pc on the year. Firms traded 434GWh on the exchange, all of which was on the daily market. Lithuania accounted for 45pc of trades, followed by the joint Latvian-Estonian market at 36pc and Finland with the remaining 19pc, regional gas exchange GET Baltic said.
Maintenance drives demand, flows
Regional works could continue driving gas flows and demand this month.
Lithuania's Klaipeda LNG terminal went off line for maintenance on 1-3 October and sendout has only partially recovered since then. Together with low sendout from Inkoo, total regional sendout, including that from the small-scale Hamina terminal, averaged 107 GWh/d on 1-8 October, down from 133 GWh/d in all of September and 152 GWh/d in October 2023. In turn, Incukalns switched to net withdrawals of 41 GWh/d during Klaipeda's maintenance and averaged net withdrawals of 13 GWh/d across the whole period of 1-8 October.
And Inkoo sendout could remain muted this month, as significant maintenance on the Balticconnector is scheduled to make all capacity from Finland towards Estonia unavailable on 14-27 October and leave just 20 GWh/d in the opposite direction. Without southward pipeline capacity, sendout must fall to levels that the domestic market can absorb. Inkoo received the 145,000m³ Arctic Princess carrier on 1 October, and another delivery is scheduled for 13 October.
But sendout from Klaipeda will probably increase, as it received its first cargo of the month on 9 October and awaits two more on 16 October and 25 October. This could cause flows on the Latvia-Lithuania border to flip, with Kiemenai so far flowing towards Lithuania at 28 GWh/d on 1-8 October, compared with 60 GWh/d of net flows towards Latvia last month.
And the 507MW nuclear unit 1 at Loviisa is not scheduled to return until late on 9 October. Similarly, 155MW of the 735MW Olkiluoto unit 2 also will be unavailable, on 6 October-25 May, because of "rotor limitation", according to an urgent market message, having only just returned from its previous outage on 6 October. But despite limited Finnish nuclear generation, strong renewable generation has also restricted demand for gas-fired output in the Finnish power mix in the first week of October.
