The price of gas falls below the regulated price. At the end of winter, Romania has large gas stocks

Winter has passed, but there are still huge quantities of gas in Romania’s deposits. The data shows that the reserves are half of the total. And this at the end of winter. Which is good news for consumers. And that’s because they are starting to follow the trend of electricity that has become massively cheaper in Europe, far below the regulated prices for example.

In recent days, the price of gas on the intra-day market in Bucharest has suffered a significant drop, reaching below the critical level of 100 lei/MWh, according to data provided by the Romanian Commodity Exchange.

The continuous price decline is attributed to high temperatures, abundant stocks accumulated during the winter and low consumption, economica.net journalists show. The gas price reached 96.6 lei/MWh in the intraday market, with a higher than usual traded volume.

Although the regulations impose a minimum price of 120 lei/MWh for the sale of gas to consumers, market prices continue to fall below this threshold. Gas producing companies, such as Romgaz and Petrom, are obliged to respect this limit for domestic consumers and thermal energy producers.

Recently, this price was reduced from 150 to 120 lei/MWh through an Emergency Ordinance that entered into force on April 1. The situation is complicated by the high temperatures, which have reduced gas consumption, and by the closure of the Bucharest Electric Power Plant, one of the biggest consumers.

In addition, low electricity prices and increased generation from renewable sources resulted in negative or zero prices during this period.

However, the high level of domestic gas production has created a surplus, and about 8.7 million cubic meters have been stored in underground storage.

Imports remained at a relatively low level, and the surplus was exported to neighboring countries such as Hungary and the Republic of Moldova.

Despite these circumstances, the degree of filling of underground deposits in Romania is 50%, and for Europe, the average is 59%.