UK GAS-Prices rise as Norwegian outage curtails flows

LONDON, April 20 (Reuters) - British wholesale gas prices rose on Friday morning as an unplanned outage in Norway curtailed flows

* Within-day contract was up 1.00 pence at 52.00 pence per therm at 0718 GMT

* Gas for delivery at the weekend was 0.60 pence higher at 51.00 p/therm

* The system is undersupplied by almost 20 million cubic metres (mcm), with demand forecast at 192 mcm and flows at 172 mcm/day, National Grid (LSE: NG.L - news) data shows

* Flows through the Langeled pipeline from Norway are at 30 mcm/day, impacted by an outage at a gas field

* Gassco announced reduced capacity of 20 mcm/day on Thursday at an unnamed field which is scheduled to last until October

* "The actual impact of the announced maintenance will much depend on which field it affects and can be judged better after the maintenance has been started," Thomson Reuters (Dusseldorf: TOC.DU - news) gas analysts said in a weekly report

* It is likely that the maintenance is at the Troll field. If it was Åsgard or Kvitebjørn, the bullish impact on the market would be more significant, they said

* "If the maintenance is at Troll, it means that the largest Norwegian gas field is unlikely to produce at or above the yearly quota that was expected by the market," they added

* On the demand side, consumption is low due to above-average temperatures but this will rise next week as temperatures fall back to seasonal normal levels

* Further along the curve, gas for May delivery was up 0.90 p at 52.30 p/therm and June gas was 0.80 p higher at 50.60 p/therm

* In the Dutch gas market, day-ahead gas at the TTF hub was 0.18 euro higher at 20.10 euros per megawatt hour

* The benchmark Dec (Shanghai: 600875.SS - news) -18 EU carbon contract was 0.13 euro higher at 13.33 euros a tonne

* Thomson Reuters analyst view: http://emea1.apps.cp.extranet.thomsonreuters.biz/cms/?pageid=united-kingdom-gas. (Reporting by Nina Chestney)