The screen was hot and the weather was hotter almost everywhereexcept on the West Coast. Put them together and you get Mondaytrading dominated by double-digit price increases at all pointsexcept the Rockies and Canadian markets.

“The screen went up from the outset, and that set the tone forcash deals,” said a marketer who reported an up-down-up trend onColumbia-Appalachia. Though not to as great a degree, the Midwestand Northeast are starting to feel a touch of the heat wave thathad stagnated over the South in recent weeks, she added, but shehad heard reports that the Northeast is due to cool off again nextweek. For now Transco’s Zone 6 (both New York City and non-NYC) ledMonday’s gains with rises of about 20 cents, while Texas EasternM-3 went up 18 cents to rank even with Zone 6 non-NYC around $2.53.

The Rockies market, which had been going great guns all lastweek, was rather subdued Monday as the only region to have somepoints retreating. Much of that resulted from a significant easingof constraints at the Opal (WY) processing plant. Last week’sturbo-expander mechanical problem that caused the constraint toleap to 340-360 MMcf/d over the weekend (see Daily GPI, June 19 and22) was repaired at 2:30 a.m. Sunday, said a spokesman for Opaloperator Williams Field Services. The maintenance cutbacks werestill larger than scheduled at about 100 MMcf/d Monday, he said,but the work is still on track to be finished Wednesday.

A Midcontinent trader said everything was moving higher astrading proceeded Monday, but a Southwest aggregator disagreed,quoting late deals for San Juan-Blanco in the mid $1.90s afterhaving sold earlier around $2. However, since California load”isn’t all that great,” it must have been the screen example forovercash cash upticks, the aggregator went on. A California sourcesaid there was a bit of extra heat in the state’s central interiorincreasing cooling load, but fog was keeping the coast cool.

A Canadian trader suggested that currently high electric powerprices might be part of the strength in both cash and futuresprices. Fixed-price intra-Alberta deals for July were being done atC$1.90-96 Monday, she said, compared to C$1.80-82 last Friday.

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