It wasn’t as bad as it might have been. That was the most optimistic assessment of Hurricane Irene’s (gradually being downgraded) weekend cruise along the Atlantic Seaboard. Most points continued to weaken a bit Monday as the impact of lost power generation load along the East Coast was being felt, but residual pockets of high heat resulted in quite a few flat to higher numbers.

A moderate majority of locations recorded losses ranging from 2-3 cents to as much as about 30 cents, with nearly all of the biggest declines occurring in the Northeast. However, following Friday’s price weakness nearly everywhere, a slight growth in market strength was evidenced in a sizeable number of points that were flat to about a nickel higher.

Friday’s flat showing by September futures, along with the restoration of industrial load from its usual weekend drop, were essentially neutral factors in Monday’s market. However, the prompt-month Nymex contract will have negative guidance for Tuesday’s cash market after expiring down 7.4 cents (see related story).

Other than some heat that has developed recently in parts of the West and the weekend hurricane-related cooling of the East Coast, there is little change in the overall weather outlook. Highs will remain merely seasonably hot in most of the South, moderate conditions will continue in the Midwest and Northeast, and other than major heat continuing to bake the Southwest, the rest of the overall forecast remains moderate to cool in most cases.

Even Texas can expect some eventual relief. Although Houston-area highs close to 100 will stick around through Tuesday, which helped to boost Houston Ship Channel and Katy quotes by about 2 cents each Monday, a gradual cooling will ensue by midweek and carry Friday peaks down to the 90 area. There is even the possibility of rain going into the weekend, which would be welcomed in the drought-ravaged state.

After devastating parts of North Carolina’s Outer Banks islands, Hurricane Irene proceeded to downgrade from Category Three to a Category One hurricane as it proceeded up the East Coast over the weekend and then reached the Northeast as merely a tropical storm before fading from the National Hurricane Center’s (NHC) monitoring screen by Monday. Flooding and wind damage was heavy but not nearly as extreme as had been feared while Irene still commanded Category Three status.

Bentek Energy estimated that East Coast natural gas demand from power outages to more than 3 million residents was expected to drop by 2.8 Bcf (see related story). “Northeast natural gas demand has dropped 1.3 Bcf since Saturday and another 0.8 Bcf of losses are likely, while the Southeast has lost 0.7 Bcf total,” the consulting firm said.

Northeast pipelines appeared to have taken little damage from Irene. El Paso Corp. spokesman Richard Wheatley said there was some flooding damage to Tennessee’s Main Line Valve 334 in Westchester County, NY, but thanks to rerouting of flows no customer impacts were experienced. Tennessee was still repairing the damage Monday, he said. Spokesman Chris Stockton said there was minor flooding and power losses at few Transco compressor stations, but backup generators were already in place, so there were no service problems. And Wendy Olson of Spectra Energy reported no impacts to Texas Eastern, Algonquin and Maritimes & Northeast operations as a result of the storm.

The remnants of Tropical Storm Jose, which formed over the weekend in the northwest Atlantic, were dissipating south of Nova Scotia while accelerating in a move to the north-northeast, NHC said. Meanwhile, Tropical Depression Twelve developed southwest of the Cape Verde Islands off West Africa but appeared likely to take a generally northwestward trek into the central Atlantic over the next few days.

ABC News reported that more than 5 million people along the East Coast remained without power Monday. The most recent death toll from Irene’s rampage was 32, ABC said.

Kern River said linepack had remained below minimum targets for about a week as of Monday. However, Westcoast linepack was back to normal after being low late last week. Kern River pricing was flat Monday, while Westcoast Station 2 saw one of the day’s biggest drops of nearly C15 cents. Station 2 was the only location being quoted at less than $3 Monday.

The Rockies market is pretty quiet for now, said a regional producer, despite a warming to the low 90s in the Denver area due Tuesday. He said a possible activation of the Apex Expansion by Kern River a month earlier than expected (see Daily GPI, Aug. 26) is somewhat promising for Rockies prices.

Northern Natural Gas signaled a warming of the Upper Midwest market. A bulletin board posting noted a normal system-weighted temperature of 67 degrees at this time of year but said projected averages of 71 both Monday and Tuesday would be rising to 76 Wednesday and 80 Thursday.

After being mostly flat from last Thursday through Friday, September bidweek numbers were falling Monday, IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) said. It cited Houston Ship Channel quotes falling from about $3.92 to just over $3.85, while Panhandle Eastern deals done on the ICE platform dropped from about $3.78 to nearly $3.72.

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