Modest warming trends, several of which would be under way as early as Wednesday, proved to be no deterrent to a suddenly gangbusters cash market. Getting an extra boost from the previous day’s screen uptick of 22.2 cents, all points were involved in large increases Tuesday.

The number of locations realizing spikes of a dollar or more expanded significantly, especially at California, Rockies, Pacific Northwest and Western Canada points, amid gains ranging from about 45 cents to the $1.20 area. Only one increase fell short of a little more than 70 cents.

There was snow on the ground Tuesday in parts of the Midcontinent and Midwest, but other than in sparsely populated mountainous areas of the West relatively little of the frozen precipitation would still be hanging around Wednesday, The Weather Channel said.

The continuing existence of heating load was undeniable, but there didn’t seem to be enough left in the Wednesday forecast to rationalize Tuesday’s skyrocketing numbers. The only predictions of lows around freezing or less were primarily concentrated in the Rockies, Alberta and a few locations in the Upper Plains/Midwest and the northern end of New England.

The cash market’s burst of prior-day futures support will end Wednesday after December gas futures dropped 8.4 cents Tuesday (see related story).

Although temperatures are scarcely frigid in the Mid-Atlantic and most of the Northeast, the deprivation of supplies for those markets that had started arriving last week at the new terminus of Rockies Express at Clarington, OH (see Daily GPI, Nov. 12) may have spurred a search for replacement gas elsewhere, especially in the Gulf Coast. A REX rupture last Saturday morning in Muskingum County, OH (see Daily GPI, Nov. 17) caused the temporary deactivation of five interconnects with takeaway pipelines in the Clarington Hub vicinity. Although the pipeline had yet to determine a timeline for completing repairs, REX spokesman Joe Hollier stressed that it was “just a guess” when he said it was likely that service to the affected delivery points could be restored this weekend.

It was “hard to believe,” said a somewhat incredulous Rockies producer, but he noted that CIG was commanding a 15-cent premium to Henry Hub. He said he couldn’t recall “ever seeing it that much in our [Rockies producers’] favor.” Cheyenne Hub exceeded the CIG premium by about 2 cents, while other Rockies points were either around parity with Henry Hub or a few cents higher. Pacific Northwest pricing points (Stanfield, Kingsgate and Sumas) in the $4.20-50 range greatly exceeded the Henry average of a little more than $3.45.

Whether forecast lows in the 20s Wednesday for much of the Rockies, while New Orleans and Houston (Henry Hub is approximately midway between them) are expected to bottom out in the mid 40s and mid 50s, respectively, had significant impact on the CIG-Henry basis differential was unclear.

“You know how some people like to husband their storage though December” just in case, said a utility buyer in the South where thermometer levels are currently chilly but still have a ways to go before reaching the freezing area. His company decided to use some of its storage supply for Wednesday instead of buying more spot gas; in light of Tuesday’s price spikes, it sounded like storage bought last summer was cheaper than the latest spot prices, he said.

The utility would prefer to not use storage at all if that was feasible, the buyer said. But in the storage environment provided by its connecting pipelines, it must look at replacement costs next summer around $5.50 (nearly a dollar above current levels), according to the Nymex strip, he said, adding that of course, the strip average could shift between now and next spring.

Analyst Stephen Smith of Stephen Smith Energy Associates said Tuesday he is now projecting a storage build of 17 Bcf to be reported for the week ending Nov. 13. That’s down from a previous estimate of 21 Bcf, Smith said.

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