Europe, battered by successive energy crises, faces the coming winter with a strategy of hoping for mild weather. The continent was already reeling from the war between Russia and Ukraine, which removed a key supplier, and has now been hit by the war in Iran, disrupting oil flows and trapping Qatari liquefied natural gas, which accounts for about a fifth of global supply. This drove August gas prices at the European bourse to almost double those of August 2025. High summer prices discourage operators from buying extra for winter storage, and many hoped the Strait of Hormuz would reopen before the weather turned, as the sudden arrival of locked-in volumes would drive winter prices below summer ones, exposing traders to potential losses.

Consequently, Europe's storage is only 69 per cent full, according to think-tank Bruegel, compared with over 80 per cent last year, making the coming winter look uncomfortably tight. Europe needs about 250bn-260bn cubic meters (bcm) of gas during an average winter, Lex calculates, based on historical data from the Oxford Institute of Energy Studies. It typically produces or buys around 200 bcm and closes the 50-60 bcm gap by drawing from storage. With over 70 bcm currently in storage, that may not seem daunting, but a long cold winter could add 25 bcm to demand, and cold snaps can be correlated across the Northern hemisphere, increasing competition for LNG between European and Asian consumers.

Europeans are closely watching this year's super El Niño, which typically brings warmer temperatures in early autumn and winter, but the second half of an El Niño winter can be cold and snowy. As Britons know, banking on the weather is a losing strategy. Relying on El Niño is a poor substitute for a robust energy plan, leaving Europe vulnerable to the whims of nature.