The European gas market couldn’t have finished winter in better shape, with gas storage over 62% full, according to the latest data from Gas Infrastructure Europe. This level is almost 2% higher than a year ago and well above the five-year average of 46% for this time of the year.

However, the heating season is not over yet. Following warmer-than-usual weather in the first half of the month, “a possible increase in heating demand briefly” is expected by Met Desk due to colder temperatures predicted to hit parts of Europe from mid-March.

“Significantly colder weather will likely be limited to the Nordics and northern Germany from mid-March, but there is a risk it could move further south”, according to Atmospheric G2 quoted by Bloomberg.

Data from Energy Quantified (EQ) shows that in Germany, Europe’s largest gas consumer, temperatures would drop from 0,40C above normal this week “to 0,70C below in the week after that and 0,90C lower in the week starting 18 March.”

Furthermore, LSEG data analyzed by Reuters revealed that “German wind power output is forecast to drop by 6.1 gigawatts (GW) from last Friday to 15.3 GW on Monday, while wind power in France is seen down 7.7 GW to 4.4 GW”.

Expectations of falling temperatures as well as lower wind generation would increase the need for fossil fuels in power production and therefore should support both gas and carbon prices.