The slow recovery from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the Gulf Coast region and Gulf of Mexico continued Tuesday with total gas production shut-ins onshore and offshore finally dropping below 8 Bcf/d, according to a report from Golden, CO-based Bentek Energy. Bentek, which is tracking gas production nominations on the region’s major pipeline systems, said shuts-ins totaled about 7,766 MMcf/d on Tuesday, down from 8,003 MMcf/d on Monday and 8,208 MMcf/d on Sunday.

About 6,055 MMcf/d of gas was scheduled to flow on the region’s pipelines Tuesday compared to 13,820 MMcf/d on Aug. 26 prior to Katrina, which indicates that about 56% of the region’s natural gas production is still shut in. The great majority of the shut-ins (7,430 MMcf/d) are onshore and offshore Louisiana with only 336 MMcf/d shut in offshore and onshore Texas, Bentek said in its Hurricane 2005 report Tuesday. Only about 2,777 MMcf/d of gas production onshore and offshore Louisiana was nominated to flow Tuesday compared with 10,207 MMcf/d on Aug. 26. While about 3,277 MMcf/d was scheduled to flow onshore and offshore Texas Tuesday compared to 3,613 MMcf/d on Aug. 26.

The cumulative deferred Gulf production total now stands at 241.3 Bcf. If as much as 6 Bcf/d on average remains offline through the end of October, that will mean that nearly 400 Bcf of gas will have been unavailable to meet demand for consumption or storage injection over just a two-month period. If, as some analysts predict, shut-ins are stretched out through the end of the year by 2 Bcf/d, that would add another 120 Bcf of unavailable gas.

Bentek said Tuesday that no gas production onshore or offshore Louisiana (excluding gas from interconnecting pipelines or storage) was scheduled to flow on the following pipelines: Sea Robin, Mississippi Canyon, High Island, Stingray, Nautilus, Chandeleur and Sabine. However, the New York Mercantile Exchange lifted the force majeure Tuesday on September and October futures deliveries at Sabine’s Henry Hub because Sabine said it will accept nominations of gas entering the system from some interconnecting pipelines (Gulf South and Columbia Gulf). Although scheduled gas production flows were zero on Sabine Tuesday morning, the pipeline apparently is accepting gas from interconnecting pipelines and some intraday flows may be scheduled.

The following are the estimated shut in totals offshore and onshore Louisiana by pipeline system based on flows scheduled Tuesday and compared to flows scheduled Aug. 26: Southern (842 MMcf/d), Transco (890), Tennessee (1,843), Destin (431), Sea Robin (386), Florida Gas (32), Trunkline (211), Texas Eastern (397), Mississippi Canyon (511), Columbia Gulf (308), Garden Banks (365), Gulf South (122), High Island (270), Texas Gas (81), Stingray (183), Nautilus (155), Chandeleur (61), Sabine (40), Gulfstream (35), Venice Lateral (219) and other pipelines (48).

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