Thursday’s cash market featured mostly small moves up or down from flat. Although cooling trends were approaching in the Northeast, South and parts of the Midwest, really frigid weather is due to remain fairly scarce in North America outside central and western Canada. The previous day’s screen drop of 14.3 cents contributed to cash losses moderately outnumbering the gains.

There were quite a few flat locations for the third day in a row, while the minority gains were mostly in single digits but ran as high as about 40 cents in the Northeast. Most losses also were in single digits in ranging from 2-3 cents to about 15 cents.

The Energy Information Administration did it again; its report of a 102 Bcf storage withdrawal during the week ending Dec. 9 handily exceeded analysts’ consensus expectations centered around the low 90s Bcf for the fifth week in a row. Though nominally bullish due to being higher than most estimates, the pull was considered bearish in falling short of last year’s 154 Bcf and the five-year average of 142 Bcf. Although January futures registered positive readings for a while following the report, the contract inched lower during the afternoon to a daily loss of 0.9 cent (see related story).

Despite experiencing one of Thursday’s biggest drops, Sumas in the mid $3.60s still commanded a premium of about 60 cents over Henry Hub.

The National Weather Service’s forecast for the Dec. 20-24 period looks pretty bearish for gas prices. The agency predicts above-normal temperatures from the Northeast through the Midwest and Upper Plains as far west as western Montana. Below-normal readings are expected in all of New Mexico plus south-central Colorado, extending through most of Texas into a swath along the Gulf Coast through the Florida panhandle.

Ruby Pipeline had no change in its latest update on the system shutdown caused by a fire at a block valve yard in Utah last weekend; the estimated return to service remained at “sometime” during the period from Saturday through next Wednesday.

After several days of reporting low linepack, Westcoast said Thursday it had returned to “healthy” levels but was trending toward maximum target levels.

A Rockies producer acknowledged that temperatures in his region are getting slightly higher, but it’s “not that much warmer,” he said, adding that there is still a fair amount of heating load for gas.

It was no surprise to producers that Ruby didn’t return to service Wednesday after all, he said; they were expecting repairs to take more time than that. And there are several replacement outlets available for formerly Ruby-targeted gas, the producer continued. He noted that Kern River linepack has been falling slowly recently, and Bison is back after a brief line replacement outage in Bowman County, ND. He mentioned TransColorado and Rockies Express as other pipes that have space for Opal-sourced supplies.

Also, when service is restored, Ruby will need to build something like 2-3 Bcf of linepack before it can start making meaningful deliveries again, he said.

Even though other markets may be softer due to overall weak fundamental influences, a Northeast marketer expects higher prices to continue Friday in his region as a result of colder forecasts. It’s still a pretty tame market now compared to the unexpected blasts of cold last December, he said. “Everybody seemed to be short [on the supply side] then, and now everybody is long.”

It was short-sleeves weather Thursday but will be coat-wearing time Friday as local lows slip to around freezing, according to a utility buyer in the South. However, he noted that those types of daily temperature wings are not unusual for the company’s service area.

The utility is comfortable with its storage withdrawals so far, the buyer went on. It’s well braced for winter — assuming normal wintry conditions ever arrive, he said.

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