2019 has seen a near phase out of Spanish coal by market forces as shown in the chart. Spain has been one of the biggest receivers of surplus LNG, with imports surging this year. This has caused periods of reversal of what has historically been a structural premium of Spanish gas prices over TTF. The combination of low gas prices, stronger carbon prices & changes to CCGT taxation, have seen gas plants load factors surge at the expense of coal. Market forces are reinforcing policy pressure to accelerate the closure of Spain’s 10GW coal fleet.
Spanish LNG imports switch out coal