It may have seemed unlikely that the Northeast would repeat the price fireworks of last Friday and Tuesday when Transco Zone 6-New York City topped out at $30 in leading multi-dollar gains at area citygates. Well, not only were Northeast numbers skyrocketing again Thursday, but they surpassed the earlier super-bullishness.

Markets outside the Northeast were quite placid, ranging mostly from flat to up 17 cents, with a large majority of gains being less than a dime.

But following a “clipper system” that had dumped snow at many locations Wednesday and faced with an arctic air mass settling into the region that would produce “quite brutal” conditions Friday, as The Weather Channel (TWC) put it, Northeast citygates climbed into the stratosphere. Several points measured their advances in quadruple digits, and Zone 6-NYC again was king of the price hill with a high of $45 and an average over $29. Four other points — Algonquin citygate, Tennessee Zone 6, Dracut and Iroquois Zone 2 — recorded peak quotes of $30 or more.

One trader said her $45 NYC deal was among the earliest ones done Thursday morning.

TWC said Friday morning lows below zero could be expected from the interior sections of southern New England and northward throughout much of upstate New York and northern New England, while the rest of the region will experience temperatures in the single digits and teens. As if that weren’t enough to make people miserable while outdoors and drastically raise heating loads, brisk winds will create “uncomfortable and dangerous wind chills,” it added.

The last time prices hit $45 or above was the trade date of Jan. 15, 2004. Even though Northeast quotes were plunging by huge amounts on the day after Iroquois Zone 2 set the all-time price record of $76, several citygates still peaked above $45, led by the Algonquin citygate’s high of $65 (see Daily GPI, Jan. 16, 2004).

“That’s amazing!” a Northeast utility buyer exclaimed in reference to five points in his region averaging more than $20 (Texas Eastern M-3 fell about 70 cents shy of joining the group). His company was largely insulated from such spikes due to having termed up nearly all winter supply, but it was exposed to a small extent by one package being tied to a daily index. “We’re pulling hard on storage,” he said, but still have a cushion of extra deliverability. The next four days will stay very cold, but a warming trend is due starting around Tuesday, the buyer said. Thus he expects Northeast prices to remain at lofty levels for the weekend, then take a plunge on Monday.

One source suggested that besides the huge demand from the Northeast giving indirect support to prices in other regions, the other markets were lifted to some degree by the previous day’s screen rise of almost 16 cents.

Other than light snows in parts of the Midwest, the rest of the nation is expected to have Friday weather considered quite mild for mid-January. Conditions in the South and southern sections of the West will be more like spring than winter. This prompted Sonat and Florida Gas Transmission to end an OFO or similar constraint affecting the Southeast market (see Transportation Notes). Kern River was reporting high linepack in all four segments again and asked shippers in a bulletin board plea to make sure they were taking delivery of all scheduled volumes.

A Houston-based marketer commented that he was glad to be trading the calm Gulf Coast market instead of the hypervolatile Northeast. Prices were trending lower in Thursday’s late deals, he said. That could be a sign of weakness Friday in non-Northeast markets.

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