Wholesale gas prices have almost halved since June!!!!!!!

1carminestocky

kernow1 wrote: »

Looks like we can enjoy some savings to come then! Today's price is less than half that of a month ago... currently 34.53

:rotfl: Don't count on it! If the energy companies had any credibility/balls left we should be seeing press releases predicting potential 50% Decreases in Domestic Fuel Prices. You know, the reverse of the '70% potential increases' press releases they released a few short months ago. We won't see them because they are pushing their ridiculously expensive fixed deals with financial tie-ins and don't want to spoil their nice, not so little earner. The industry needs re-rationalising IMO.

backfoot

kernow1 wrote: »

Looks like we can enjoy some savings to come then! Today's price is less than half that of a month ago... currently 34.53

Yes he made a schoolboy error there.:rotfl:

It's pretty obvious, to all but the employee stooges, that UK customers have been and continue to be ripped off.It's not even subtle any more.They stick twp fingers up to all of us and just know they can get away it.

The only slim hope is that Gordon finally gets the message and takes them all under state control.It's already a cartel of the 6 so it may as well all become one.It's proved an expensive and unproductive mistake since deregulation.

There are two many future energy decisions to be left in the hands of these theives.

He might just save his own skin if he took decisive action as he did with the Banks.;)

teddyco

I would like to see the OPEC monopoly abolished by the United Nations to make it harder for oil producing countries to manipulate prices. If we could break up this long-standing cartel, life would be so much easier for everyone; i.e. Europe, USA, UK and China.

kernow1

not sure about all the laughing going on. Consumer prices do follow the trend of wholesale prices, so of course prices will come down, as they did in the first half of 2007.
And do you guys really think that it's another big UK rip off? Come on, gas prices everywhere have been going up and the UK's prices are still amongst the lowest in the EU-15.
I agree with teddyco, though- it's a worldwide price manipulation problem.

basmic

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7673909.stm

Row developing over energy bills

A debate is developing after a consumer watchdog called for domestic energy bills to fall in tandem with plummeting oil prices.

A barrel of oil has fallen from a high of around $147 in July to around $70 and Consumer Focus wants to see domestic bills dropping as a result.

But the Energy Retail Association says bills will not fall immediately as gas wholesale prices remain high.

Petrol prices and airlines' fuel surcharges have been cut recently.

Market fears

Fears of the global economy falling into recession have pushed down the price of crude oil.

This has led to the price of petrol for motorists dipping below £1 a litre at some retailers for the first time since December last year. British Airways and Virgin have also cut the fuel surcharge levied from some passengers.

But domestic energy bills, which are linked to the price of oil, show no sign of falling.

"Oil prices have been falling since July, yet consumers have seen unprecedented rises in their gas and electricity costs. Consumers must now be wondering why they are left waiting," said Ed Mayo, chief executive of watchdog Consumer Focus - a new merger of Energywatch and the National Consumer Council.

"We want immediate action from energy companies to reduce their prices in line with falling oil prices. This will be good not just for consumers, but for the whole economy."

He said regulator Ofgem should step in.

Rising bills

Consumer Focus said that gas prices have risen by 51% since the start of the year, and electricity bills up by 28% - putting the average annual household energy bill at £1,308.

However, energy analyst John Hall said that although the two were linked, gas prices did not rocket as much as oil prices earlier in the year and so now did not have so far to fall.

And Garry Felgate, of the Energy Retail Association, told the BBC's Working Lunch programme that gas wholesale prices had not shifted in the way that oil prices had.

He said that if this wholesale price fell, then suppliers were ready to cut bills.

But he added that gas and electricity supplies were bought in advance for the winter, so there would be a lag on any changes in tariffs.

"It is critical that we make sure we have supplies. We are not an energy island," he said.

View from the Commons

MPs joined the debate on Thursday, when Energy Minister Mike O'Brien said he wanted to see the oil price fall feed through into gas and electricity prices.

"If there are benefits we want to see them feed through, not just to individuals who have to pay the bills, but to the economy as a whole to give it a boost," he said.

Conservative energy spokesman Charles Hendry said the government had been slow to offer support for those facing fuel poverty as prices rose.

He also criticised the government for failing to establish a framework for bringing forward investment in new energy-generating capacity or gas storage. This had forced up costs to domestic users and businesses, Mr Hendry said.

For the Liberal Democrats, Steve Webb said that "super-smart meters" should be introduced. These would be able to choose the cheapest energy tariff and supplier for customers automatically.

1carminestocky

teddyco wrote: »

I would like to see the OPEC monopoly abolished by the United Nations to make it harder for oil producing countries to manipulate prices. If we could break up this long-standing cartel, life would be so much easier for everyone; i.e. Europe, USA, UK and China.

So, there's an oil cartel but oil is plummeting in price and the regulator has just ruled that there ISN'T a cartel in the UK energy industry but prices are sky high...

1carminestocky

backfoot wrote: »

Yes he made a schoolboy error there.:rotfl:

It's pretty obvious, to all but the employee stooges, that UK customers have been and continue to be ripped off.It's not even subtle any more.They stick twp fingers up to all of us and just know they can get away it.

The only slim hope is that Gordon finally gets the message and takes them all under state control.It's already a cartel of the 6 so it may as well all become one.It's proved an expensive and unproductive mistake since deregulation.

There are two many future energy decisions to be left in the hands of these theives.

He might just save his own skin if he took decisive action as he did with the Banks.;)

There DO seem even more of these just lately - and most posting during 'regular' office hours....

Oh, and I totally agree with you about nationalisation. The enenrgy company apologists (employees :rolleyes: ) often talk about increased efficiency with private enterprise - total rot! We have the ridiculous situation whereby we have 6 separate sales teams, 6 separate 'retentions' teams and 6 separate sets of door knockers (or paid liars as they have been called by people more cynical than I, lol). Oh, not forgetting 6 separate boards of directors and 6 separate massively remunerated CEOs/Chairmen. It's a nonsense and it HAS to be stopped.

mech_2

backfoot wrote: »

Yes he made a schoolboy error there.:rotfl:

Not really. It's a blip. It will bounce back.

The day-ahead spot price has fallen the last couple of weeks because we've had unseasonally warm weather across northern Europe. The suppliers have already bought enough capacity ahead of time at higher rates. So the prompt price is cheap because no one's buying it. Therefore the consumer isn't benefiting.

If you look at month-ahead prices, they've barely shifted at all from September's level.

I think the problem is that people don't really have a good idea what is going on with prices. So I have spent quite some time online, hunting down some figures and I have made this graph to try and give an idea of the big picture to anyone who is interested:



The UK day ahead data is lacking in detail for the older data as I haven't found a good source of historical figures. I believe it is accurate enough for the purposes of comparison. The front month plot is the average of trades each day for the month ahead. I have also included US daily data to help indicate what the UK day-ahead price would probably be if it followed oil (exchange-rate adjusted on a per-day basis). As you can see, it's not far off when there is plentiful supply, but as day ahead tends to track the month ahead price, we are due for a correction when the weather gets cold again. I have also added some predictions of my own. It will be interesting to see what happens.

The prices are high due to expectations of higher demand as we enter winter. If you look at the graph last year there was a similar upward surge at the start of the heating season and then the line got closer to US prices again in the spring. This crops up on older data too. I think it's because the UK is so heavily dependant on gas compared to other countries.

Ofgem have a good comparison of wholesale versus retail prices on pages 76-78 of this document here: http://www.ofgem.gov.uk/Markets/RetMkts/ensuppro/Documents1/Energy%20Supply%20Probe%20-%20Initial%20Findings%20Report.pdf


Sources for my graph:
UK day ahead: Various, plus http://www.upstreamonline.com/market_data/?id=markets_gas
UK front month: https://www.theice.com/marketdata/ukNaturalGasView/ukNatGasIndexView.jsp
Henry Hub: http://www.neo.ne.gov/statshtml/124.htm
Exchange rates: http://www.dollars2pounds.com/RatesHistory.php

Cardew

Mech,
Interesting graph, which unfortunately will be either ignored(or not understood) by those who know with absolute certainty that our high energy prices are caused by the huge profits made by Utility companies.

backfoot

Cardew,

Very troll like.Thought you were above such things,but never mind you are obviously getting very involved and taking it personally.:D

Some of us,are naturally sceptical as is the majority of the country,so please don't knock the people,many of whom struggle to pay these charges.

Mech's graphs are understood and he/she has gone to a lot of work to plot them.Thank you.

What would be really interesting is to see the output prices charged over these periods and further back if possible.I have long thought that customers were hit with hefty increases as long ago as five years ago,when there didn't seem to be this volatility in input costs.That set an increasing base,above inflation, on which these more recent enormous increases have been levied.

Furthermore it always struck me that many of the suppliers chose peaks/spikes in the spot price to justify swingeing increases, knowing full well that this would set them up over winter periods when they hit high volumes.This year looks like the most obvious abuse so far.

Mech, what would be the best measure of charges to customers, to plot on top of your graphs, to illustrate whether there is any truth in what I have said?

Presumably something for BG's standard tariff price per therm might be a good measure? Are you able to provide that data?:beer: