French strike curbs power supply, wind to ease after peaking at 99 GW

London — Continued strikes in France curbed conventional power supply Wednesday by around 5 GW, while spot prices are set to rebound as wind across Europe, which peaked at 99 GW overnight, is set to fall, system operator data showed.

France's nuclear output peaked Wednesday morning at 50.8 GW, little changed from Tuesday, but down from Monday's winter-to-date high of 54.5 GW, with three nuclear power plants affected by strike-related output restrictions.

Coal output remained at zero with workers at Cordemais and Le Havre joining the action, while gas generation was cut by over 1 GW with Blenod and both units at Martigues Ponteau hit, according to grid operator RTE.

Wind generation across Europe peaked at 99.5 GW Tuesday evening, hourly operator data on the Entso-e platform aggregated by WindEurope showed.

That is marginally below a record high of 102 GW set on January 13 last year.

Wind covered 22.8% of Europe's power demand on Tuesday, averaging 93 GW throughout the day, the WindEurope data show.

Winds are forecast to ease Wednesday and drop sharply Thursday with less windy and slightly cooler weather ahead supporting French week-ahead power contracts.

French week-ahead baseload was seen trading at Eur41.50/MWh on EEX, almost 20% above this week's level with French day-ahead barely settling above Eur30/MWh so far this week, exchange data shows.

French demand is forecast to hit the highest so far this winter next week with RTE pegging peak demand at 82.4 GW Tuesday as temperatures dip just below seasonal norms, its seven-day outlook shows.