Record-warm ocean surface temperatures fueled above-average activity during the 2023 Atlantic hurricane season. Still, the storms steered clear of the U.S. energy complex and made no lasting impact on natural gas production or prices.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said in a report this week that 20 official storms emerged in the Atlantic basin in 2023 – 19 named storms and one unnamed subtropical system that formed in January – ranking the season as the fourth most active on record.

Seven storms were hurricanes and three intensified into major hurricanes, NOAA said. An average season has 14 named storms, seven hurricanes and three major hurricanes. The agency’s records date back to 1950. While powerful storms can of course form at any point,...