OREANDA-NEWS. Gas prices in Europe at auction on Tuesday, February 1, fell below $900. The cost of March futures in the European TTF hub in the Netherlands fell by 11.5% and as of 12:42 Moscow time amounted to €74.5 per MWh, or $880.65 per 1,000 cubic meters. m (at the current exchange rate), according to the data of the ICE exchange.

The reason for the decline in quotations was the growth of Gazprom's deliveries in the Ukrainian direction and the fall in the reverse in the Polish direction, analysts at ITI Capital noted. As of February 1, the planned volume of gas pumping increased to 107.7 million cubic meters. m against 54 million cubic meters. m per day on average in January.

At the same time, the reverse flow through the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline fell almost six times on Tuesday compared to Monday. However, "Gazprom" again did not book the pumping of gas to Europe. Due to the lack of applications for the supply of gas from European customers, the Russian gas giant has been refusing to book pumping through the pipeline for 42 days in a row, follows from the GSA Platform data.

It is expected that this year the growth rate of gas demand in the world will noticeably slow down. According to the forecast of the International Energy Agency, in 2022 the demand for natural gas in the world will grow by only 0.9% against 4.6% a year earlier. At the same time, demand will grow in all regions of the world, except for Europe, where a decrease of 4% is expected due to the active use of renewable energy sources, the IEA believes. This could lower gas prices in Europe.