Some traders may have been surprised to see prices leveling off or climbing a few cents higher at most non-western points Thursday. But fundamental weather support was rising, as colder weather either had entered or was due in the Northeast, Gulf Coast production area and Pacific Northwest. Also, the screen was marginally higher during the morning, before turning negative later.

Cash gains tended to be small, though, at around a nickel or less. And numbers in the West, which had resisted the overall market softness earlier in the week, ranged from flat to down a nickel, despite a frigid snowstorm expected to hit the Pacific Northwest this weekend and penetrate as far south as Northern California.

Houston traders may have become at least temporary bullish believers when they went to work comfortable in short sleeves, but broke for lunch to find temperatures had plunged into the 40s.

The day’s biggest loss of about a dime came at the Florida citygate, where an in-state buyer said demand continues to weaken because of temperatures that rarely get below 70 degrees. The Florida citygate’s fall, combined with upticks at Transco Zone 6-NYC and Iroquois Zone 2, to leave the three of them in a virtual dead heat for the title of the market’s second-most-expensive point, trailing only Algonquin citygates in the mid $2.40s.

Sources saw Thursday’s mild firmness as a short-lived phenomenon, and expect it to be replaced with mild softness again today. They pointed out that February futures eventually ended the day down nearly 3 cents and noted the expected demand falloff associated with a weekend.

Tennessee offered another reason to anticipate softness. It told shippers it was experiencing such high linepack that positive point operator imbalances could jeopardize its operational integrity. In a Critical Period alert, Tennessee asked that all LMS and SA contracts be nominated and scheduled in balance to avoid pipeline adjustment of receipts or deliveries, and/or issuance of a systemwide OFO. (Affiliate East Tennessee Natural Gas sent a “System Warning” e-mail Thursday saying that Tennessee actually had declared a Balancing Alert OFO, but later sent a clarification after Daily GPI inquiries to Tennessee revealed that an OFO was only under consideration.)

That wasn’t the only electronic bulletin board fiasco. A couple of Rockies sources confessed that they were in the dark about Opal Plant conditions, after Kern River posted a note saying that affiliate and plant operator Williams Field Services had reported volume cutbacks due to equipment problems in the upstream Jonah Field. However, a Williams spokesman said no such problems existed and only that a “nominations snafu” had occurred (see Transportation Notes).

But an aggregator said the Opal situation was still “a mess. They [WFS] have been reporting problems there nearly all month.” And a marketer chimed in that he had lost some Opal gas effective with Wednesday afternoon’s intraday 2 cycle, but hadn’t received any indication it was due to a “nominations snafu.”

A Calgary-based producer said the price spread between intra-Alberta and eastern Canada has gotten so tight recently that “it’s hard to move much gas” long-haul. He ticked off a few reasons to expect some bullishness in provincial prices today (a marketer reported them down C6-7 cents Thursday): NOVA was drafting hard because it lost some field receipts; the pipeline still has a 0/+20% imbalance tolerance range in place to deter drafting; about 700 MMcf/d is currently off the system because of the installation of new compression in northern Alberta; and “it’s below freezing today and supposed to get even colder over the weekend, so between that and the supply shortfall I’ve got to think intra-Alberta prices will be seeing a rebound.”

The February bidweek officially starts today, but nobody seemed to be in any rush to get going. An East Coast LDC buyer said Thursday, “I’ve had a couple of suppliers wanting to discuss February gas,” but they weren’t talking about any real numbers yet. Most traders are in an information-gathering mode only so far, she added.

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