Natural gas prices surged in Europe after a fire damaged an LNG export terminal in the US, wiping out US deliveries to a market which was already hurting from the denial of embargoed Russian gas. The Freeport LNG facility in Texas, responsible for about one fifth of all US exports of the fuel, will be out of commission for at least three weeks.

In Amsterdam, where gas had been in a six-day-long falling streak, benchmark futures reversed course, and in the UK, prices rose 39%. For the first four months of this year, the US sent about 75% of all its LNG exports to Europe.

As the US shipments end, European consumers are coping with other shortfalls in supply. In Norway, key facilities are undergoing annual maintenance this week. Meanwhile Russia has cut off several nations for failing to meet Moscow’s demand that they pay for their gas in rubles.

le Hansen, head of commodity strategy at Saxo Bank A/S said, “The event highlights Europe’s precarious situation and it would likely signal an end for now to the calm trading seen in recent weeks. An export halt during the high demand winter months would have triggered a much bigger reaction.”

Ample supplies of US LNG had calmed the European markets as other sources were gradually shut off and prices swung wildly earlier this year.

Tom Marzec-Manser, head of gas analytics at ICIS said, “In the last three months, 68% of all Freeport cargoes were delivered into European markets. So traders in Europe will be eagerly watching and waiting to see if this outage ends up lasting longer than initially predicted by the operator.”

Analysts at Evercore ISI said in a note that although the extent of the damage at the Freeport facility is not clear, the fire could prevent about 16% of total US LNG export capacity, “for an unknown period if the fire damage proves difficult to repair.”

European benchmark Dutch front-month gas rose 15% to 91.50 euros per megawatt-hour by 9:29 in Amsterdam. Previously the contract dropped 16% over the last six sessions.

LNG suppliers will seek out replacement shipments from the spot market, but according to traders in Asia, there are dwindling supplies available. Suppliers will likely turn to reserve inventories, draining them just as they were near getting back to normal, historic averages. Meanwhile shipments of Russian gas via the Nord Stream Pipeline to Germany are continuing to edge downward as of Thursday.

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