North American natural gas futures were kept in check this week as the hurricane season threatened to kick into gear at the end of a particularly hot summer.

On Thursday, news that U.S. storage surpluses were tightening helped give futures prices a little boost. The September New York Mercantile Exchange gas futures contract settled at $2.519/MMBtu, up 2.2 cents.

NatGasWeather said the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) latest gas storage report might “provide reason for front month September contracts to make another run for $2.70 ahead of Tuesday’s expiration.  As we’ve been mentioning, $2.70 is the level prices keep returning to the past 2-plus months anytime prices start to work decently away from it.” 

U.S. production remains strong, despite continued