Southern Cone gas and power short-term outlook: October

Gas and power markets in the Southern Cone can finally relax in 2022. While the end of the winter reduced the tightness of the Argentinian gas market balance, the higher natural gas availability allowed the country to resume exports to Chile on a firm basis. It has also reduced its requirements for Bolivian gas, and Bolivia can finally commit to its first agreements with new buyers in Brazil. Meanwhile, the above-average Brazilian hydrology has allowed the system operator to shut down thermal plants, even though power demand recovered significantly in October. Sustaining this scenario is ideal as it brings down the region’s exposure to the LNG spot market, but it is still uncertain how long it will last. Note: we are increasing the time horizon of this short-term outlook report to December 2023. In the forthcoming reports, we will keep the time horizon of analysis and data to the end of the following year.