After weeks of bad weather, Britain's gas reserves have been exhausted, and there are fears that energy prices may soar.
As cold weather continues, households are forced to increase their heating usage, which makes demand for natural gas 20% higher than normal.
On Thursday night, gas inventories at Britain's largest storage facility were reported to be only 10%, compared with 49% at this time last year.
An energy expert has warned that if the UK is forced to make up for the shortfall by importing more liquefied natural gas from elsewhere, energy prices will soar.
Andrew Horstead of energy consulting firm Utilyx told The Times: "There is a huge pressure on existing infrastructure.
"We almost reached the limit from imports through the pipeline.
The biggest problem is that there is only a small amount of flexibility left in the system.
He added that the UK would be difficult to deal with if technical problems caused an unexpected shutdown of the North Sea gas field.
Matt Osborne, risk manager at Inenco, an energy consulting and brokerage firm, told Sky News that wholesale prices soared about 20% overnight, prompting the industry to respond quickly.
Internal gas prices Friday morning
Subsequently, after a pump failure in Buckton, Norfolk, pipes connecting Belgium and the UK closed, and delivery on the same day rose more than 50% from Thursday's closing price.
Downing Street said David Cameron, Britain's prime minister, was "confident" of continuing to meet Britain's gas demand ".
A spokesman said: "The absolute key to this is that supply is not exhausted.
"The natural gas market is the source of our supply and the market continues to work well.
"The prime minister's main concern is that gas supplies are continuing.
It is absolutely clear that supply is not exhausted.
When asked if the prime minister was confident to continue to do so, the spokesman replied: "There is absolutely confidence.
"The UK is more vulnerable to gas shortages than other countries because of its limited storage capacity and only 15 days of energy supply.
But a spokesman for the US Department of Environment and Climate Change (DECC) insisted that "gas supply is not exhausted ".
The spokesman said: "The current storage level is very low --
As you expect at the end of winter
The gas market in Britain is also very tight.
"But the market reacted the same way it was designed --
Gas prices are rising and supply is keeping up accordingly.
"Gas storage will never be the only gas source to meet our needs, so it is misleading to talk purely about how many days of supply has been stored.
However, with the head of the energy giant SSE warning of the "very real risk" of the lights going out in the UK, concerns about gas have emerged.
Ian Marchant said the government underestimated the issue because he announced plans to cut power generation in five locations because the power stations are either uneconomical or are about to end their lives.
He said: "It seems that the government has greatly underestimated the scale of the capacity crisis facing the UK in the next three years, so the risk of lights going out is very high.
"He said that energy regulator Ofgem recently expressed real concern about the decline in the marginal power generation capacity in the UK and is expected to close the plant in the next few years, with an expectation of 1-in-
The possibility of the lamp going out.
Mr. Marchant added: "Most of the cuts in power generation capacity that we announced today and the delay in new investments are unlikely to be included in this analysis.
"(This) emphasizes that this situation may be more serious than they predicted.
A decc spokesperson added: "We are in close contact with the State Grid and if they believe there is a risk of a supply shortage, they are able to enter the market to find gas and increase incentives for gas suppliers.