The market is starting to lose some heating load in the South due to moderating weather trends, but enough of it will remain Thursday in the Midwest and Northeast that prices were in a climbing pattern at all points Wednesday. Cash numbers also derived support from significant day-earlier advances across Nymex’s energy futures complex.

Northeast citygates, whose Tuesday gains were way out ahead of the general market, more closely fit in with Wednesday’s overall increases that ranged from about a nickel to a little more than 40 cents. Although and/or freezing temperatures will persist in the Northeast Thursday, wind chill factors are expected to be much less severe.

Physical gas can count on continued previous-day screen support Thursday, but not as much. April natural gas futures rose only 3.3 cents Wednesday, compared to the dime-greater increase on Tuesday. Crude oil for April delivery shrugged off bearish inventory reports Wednesday morning in soaring to within 2 cents of the all-time Nymex record of $55.67/bbl for crude, set last October. However, later selling pressure caused the contract to retreat to a close of $54.77, up only 18 cents.

Western temperatures will remain well above seasonal norms Thursday, according to The Weather Channel, but most points in the region realized even larger upticks Wednesday than they had on Tuesday. One source cited the enhanced strength as largely a reflection of Tuesday’s energy futures gains.

A Midwest marketer reported still having snow on the ground from the weekend in her city, but at least the icy precipitation had stopped, she said. “This is definitely a colder than normal March so far,” she went on, and it looks like the Midwest can’t expect any significant break in the weather “until maybe the end of next week.” She called Wednesday’s rise of Michigan citygates into the high $7.10s “pretty dreadful.”

A suspension of production on segments of Tennessee and Columbia Gulf connected to the Blue Water System offshore Louisiana turned out to be minimal (see Transportation Notes). Tennessee isolated a lateral on which a leak had occurred, allowing it to restore flows at 14 meters while keeping only one meter shut in. Columbia Gulf rescinded shut-in orders for all of its affected meters.

In a six- to 10-day forecast update Wednesday, the National Weather Service enlarged the area covering almost the entire Lower 48 states in which it had predicted below normal temperatures during the March 14-18 workweek (see Daily GPI, March 9). In its revision for the March 15-19 period, NWS said only peninsular Florida, South Texas and the coastal half of the southern two-thirds of California are likely to experience normal temperatures, with below normal readings expected everywhere else.

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