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The Calm Before the Cold: What Businesses Should Do Before Winter Pricing Hits

The Calm Before the Cold: What Businesses Should Do Before Winter Pricing Hits

The Calm Before the Cold: What Businesses Should Do Before Winter Pricing Hits

Every fall, mid-to-large businesses see soft shoulder-season rates and decide to ride variable pricing a little longer. Then one cold snap resets the market. After Winter Storm Fern last January, Henry Hub natural gas averaged $7.72/MMBtu, more than double today's levels (EIA).

Here is what matters in each major market, and what to check before December.

PJM: Your capacity cost is set. Control what's left.

CapacityWhat to watchAction
PJMCapacity for June 2026 to May 2027 cleared at the $329.17/MW-day cap, a recordWhat you can still control: the energy portion of your rate, and how capacity appears on your contract.Confirm whether capacity is a pass-through or bundled. Pass-through means any mid-term change lands on your bill.

ERCOT: Fern was the reminder.

CapacityWhat to watchAction
ERCOTERCOT has no capacity market. Scarcity shows up directly in energy prices.The trap: businesses on index or real-time pricing look smart in October and get burned in January.If you are fully indexed, consider fixing at least your December to February volumes now.

MISO: Winter is an energy story, not a capacity story.

CapacityWhat to watchAction
MISOMISO’s 2026/27 winter capacity price cleared at just $35.97/MW-dayThe trap: reading low capacity prices as “winter will be cheap.”Focus your winter hedge on energy volumes, not capacity.

The common thread: natural gas

Winter Storm Fern
$7.72/MMBtu
Henry Hub natural gas averaged
more than double today’s levelser the term
Storage
2%
Above the five-year average
entering winter
EIA forecast
$3.16/MMBtu
Henry Hub average
in 2027
The catch: averages hide spikes. Fern showed how fast a comfortable market can double.

Your pre-winter contract checklist

  1. Expiry date
    Does any contract roll to holdover or variable rates between November and March?
  2. Capacity treatment
    Pass-through or fixed? (critical in PJM)
  3. Swing/bandwidth limits
    Will a cold-weather usage spike trigger penalties above your contracted range?
  4. Index exposure
    What share of your winter volume floats with the market?
  5. Layering
    Have you split purchases across dates instead of buying all at once?
  6. Multi-site timing
    Do your locations renew on different dates you could consolidate?

The bottom line

The shoulder season is when you have leverage. Once the first cold front hits, forward prices move and options shrink.

ClearCore can review your contracts across PJM, ERCOT and MISO and show where you are exposed this winter.

Book a free contract review before December.

Sources

For informational purposes only; not a guarantee of future prices.

Texas Energy Market Update: September 2026 ›

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