As expected, Thursday’s 17.8-cent advance by August futures was outweighed in Friday’s cash market trading by relatively mild weather outside the interior West and the loss of industrial load over a weekend. The result was falling prices at nearly all points. Flat to a little more than 20 cents higher quotes at several western points kept mixed price movement in play.

The overall market saw declines ranging from 2-3 cents to about a quarter. The largest drops were clustered in the Northeast, while the West had the lion’s share of small dips.

The week ended with Henry Hub and August futures essentially at parity. On Thursday the Hub had lagged behind the Nymex contract by about 20 cents.

The South was expected to remain milder than usual with a cold front moving in during the week, which The Weather Channel (TWC) called “a rarity for mid-summer.” A cold front from Canada would invade the Northeast, causing “pleasantly September-like” temperatures peaking in the 70s and lower 80s during the day and then dipping into the 50s and 60s overnight with some 40s in the mountains, TWC said.

The Midwest also was due to experience below-normal conditions, but highs in the 90s and even around 100 in some instances would continue to keep the Plains sizzling.

Hot weather had proved unable to avert softer prices in the Rockies as the week began, but it did the trick Friday. With Salt Lake City and Casper, WY, both predicted to hit 100 degrees Saturday and a high of 97 due in Denver, several Rockies and Pacific Northwest points were flat to higher, and the others recorded only modest losses. And the PG&E citygate was flat due to forecasts of inland California high temperatures climbing into the mid to high 90s over the weekend.

A Rockies source noted that it was pretty much clear sailing for transportation in the Rockies again with Northwest constraints being lifted Friday (see Transportation Notes). He also said injection capacity had returned to normal at Questar’s Clay Basin storage facility following a two-day reduction earlier in the week.

Another factor supporting Rockies prices was that Kinder Morgan Interstate (KMI) had reported agricultural irrigation load growing substantially on its system, so the pipeline was telling customers to get in balance to make room for the increased volumes of gas, the source said. KMI usually has excess capacity out of the Rockies, he added.

A marketer in the Upper Midwest reported no purchases for the weekend due to cool weather in her area. It was getting “a little chilly” with overnight lows in the 50s, but not cold enough to spur heating demand, she said. Her company has “almost” topped off its customers’ storage accounts, she said, and she thinks a few of them might not even want to fill their accounts unless really low prices come along.

The Weather 2000 consulting firm sees bullishly hot weather coming up in some areas. The Great Lakes, Ohio Valley, Mid-Atlantic and Northeast are “poised for [an] extremely steamy final week of July,” it said in an advisory note to clients. However, what it termed the “soggy [and] stormy” South-Central U.S. will continue its “year without a summer,” said Weather 2000, and the far West and Southwest are due to “back off [the] heat throttle” as troughs return and early monsoon-like moisture enters the weather picture.

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