Despite forecasts for severely cold weather throughout most of the East by the beginning of this week, and proliferating anticipatory restrictions by pipelines, prices fell at all points Friday except for Northeast citygates. The well-below-expectations storage withdrawal report a day earlier and the accompanying 28.9-cent futures dive, along with the decline of industrial load over a weekend, obviously outweighed the frigid predictions in the minds of most cash traders.

Most of the market recorded declines ranging from about 15 cents to nearly C50 cents. The PG&E citygate saw one of the biggest losses even though the utility said linepack on its California Gas Transmission system would be barely above minimum target levels during the weekend.

Northeast citygate spikes of a little more than $1.20 to the $4.15 area ran contrary to the overall softness. A storm moving out of the Midwest was expected to track across the Mid-Atlantic Saturday and off the New Jersey coast that night, said The Weather Channel (TWC), adding that heavy snow would spread eastward during the weekend across southern New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and finally southern New England.

Quotes for both Transco Zone 6-New York and the Algonquin citygate topped out at the $14 level. Among the Northeast citygates, only Texas Eastern M-3 and Transco Zone 6-non New York failed to average more than $10.

Predicted Saturday lows in the teens were numerous in the Northeast and Midwest. However, the harsh forecast did not have the same price-boosting effect in the Midwest that it did in the Northeast. Instead, Chicago and Michigan citygates fell 25-35 cents or so.

One factor in Friday’s general price weakness was that although lows in the vicinity of freezing were predicted for Saturday east of the Mississippi River in the South, they would be counterbalanced to some extent by relatively moderate highs in the mid to upper 50s and 60s. And the area west of the Mississippi River would be fairly mild through Sunday before starting to feel the effects of the eastern cold more strongly early this week. That was hardly the worst of the South’s forecast, however. An arctic cold front will invade the region Wednesday and Thursday, according to TWC, and high temperatures will reach only the 20s and low 30s from Oklahoma to Tennessee by Thursday.

Most of the West was due to be relatively mild during the weekend in comparison with the East’s northern market areas. Even the Rockies could expect highs in the 40s Saturday, while temperatures would warm to the 70s and low 80s in Southern California, TWC said.

Transco, Northern Natural Gas and ANR were adding OFOs or similar restrictions to the ones that had already been announced (see Transportation Notes).

Because the worst of the current cold blast wouldn’t be in place until the beginning of the week, a Midwestern marketer said deals for Monday-only flows were popular Friday. The weekend would be quite cold in his region, he said, but nothing like the super-cold conditions that wouldn’t really start until Monday. He noted the projection by Northern of a system weighted average temperature of five degrees Monday.

The marketer said he anticipates a pretty healthy rebound in eastern prices because the frigid forecasts will stay in effect all through the coming week. He said power generation load wasn’t all that strong among his company’s usual customers Friday, but he expects it to rise dramatically this week.

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