Prices continued to rise at nearly all points Wednesday as the South began contributing some heating load of its own to what already existed from the Northeast through the Rockies. Temperatures were due to keep falling Thursday in the Northeast and sections of the Midwest, but some moderation was forecast for the Rockies.

Only a couple of losses ranging from a couple of pennies to about a dime averted an across the board run of firmness. The rest of the market was flat to about 35 cents higher, with Northeast citygates recording most of the largest gains.

April natural gas futures will continue to provide negative guidance for Thursday’s cash market after the contract followed up Tuesday’s 2.5-cent loss by staying in positive territory for most of Wednesday but eventually sliding to a decline of 4.2 cents influenced largely by major weakness in crude oil futures (see related story).

Although a bulletin board posting projected that the system weighted average temperature in the Northern Natural Gas service area will be rising from about four degrees Wednesday to the mid teens Thursday and upper 20s Friday, the pipeline kept a System Overrun Limitation for all market-area zones in place through at least Thursday.

A cold front that had invaded the midsection of the previously balmy South Tuesday was starting to spread to both ends of the region and was due to limit highs to the 40s and 50s Thursday. That didn’t portend a great increase in heating demand, but it almost certainly would have many Southerners running their furnaces at least part-time.

The Northeast, where temperatures had been bottoming out around freezing or slightly higher Wednesday, could expect lows mostly in the 20s near the coast and in the teens at some inland locations Thursday. Such readings would rival the already frigid conditions in the Midwest.

Sub-freezing lows are due to continue in the Rockies but be a little higher. And the predicted low of 27 in Denver will be offset to some extent by another high around 50. The related points of Sumas and Westcoast Station 2 saw Wednesday’s biggest price gains despite a warming trend due in their primary market area of the Pacific Northwest.

A Northeast marketer said he thinks prices are due for one more day of overall firmness Thursday because of lingering cold weather but then should begin to soften Friday as weekend forecasts show some moderation. There was a “small amount” of profit available Wednesday from variable costs in transporting gas from the Gulf Coast to the Northeast, he said. Although the cash market has shown strength for two days in a row, he perceives it as pretty quiet currently.

For the third week in a row the National Weather Service revised its initial six- to 10-day forecast posted Tuesday afternoon (see Daily GPI, March 11), this time for the March 16-20 workweek. Now the agency expects below-normal temperatures to have receded to everywhere east of a line running from the western end of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula through eastern Wisconsin to western Mississippi. It predicts that only normal conditions in most of the Pacific Northwest will be exempted from above-normal readings having expanded to almost everywhere west of a line running roughly southward from the central Dakotas through central Texas.

SunTrust Robinson Humphrey analyst Cameron Horwitz said he expects a 107 Bcf storage withdrawal to be reported for the week ending March 6. Tim Evans of Citi Futures Perspective looks for a slightly larger pull of 110 Bcf, but predicts large declines to 30 Bcf and 45 Bcf in the weeks ending March 13 and March 20, respectively.

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