Electricity prices are spiking

Even with a slight drop Monday, Greece's wholesale electricity market remained the most expensive in the European Union.

The wholesale electricity price stood at €147.10 per megawatt-hour, down 5% from Sunday's €154.63/MWh. Next were Bulgaria and Romania, two countries with a highly integrated grid at €145.58, while in most western and northern EU countries prices ranged between €100 and €123.

The reason for the inflated price is the big contribution of natural gas (over 42% Monday) to the source mix and the relatively low one of renewable sources (21.56% Sunday and 24.40% Monday).

The news from the natural gas front is not good: a strike at Chevron's liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage facilities in Australia that will start on September 7 has affected the market. At the Netherlands' TTF gas futures market, the price of gas rose 8% to €37.57/MWh, with December...