A Gulf Coast producer figured it had to be “storm hype”outweighing a sharply lower gas futures screen and causing nearlyall cash markets to soar by a dime or more Monday. Even mild tocool temperatures and the additional negative influence of Novembercrude oil futures plunging by 78 cents to settle below $24/bbl forthe first time in weeks failed to avert substantial upticks forspot gas.

Almost every point saw price increases ranging from about a dimeto as much as 20 cents. Canadian gas was about the onlynon-participant in an overall bull market. Sumas numbers werebarely 3-4 cents higher as the nearby Jackson Prairie storagefacility began downhole testing Monday that will last throughThursday. The inability to make injections at Jackson Prairielimited Northwest Pipeline’s ability to handle extra volumes atSumas, a Calgary marketer said. And intra-Alberta prices actuallyfell into the C$3.10s, she added, as NOVA linepack was “back ingood shape” after being drafted heavily late last week whileweather was much colder. NOVA itself said nominations at ABC(Alberta/British Columbia border) for Monday exceeded capacity, soit was not authorizing any IT for the Oct. 4 Evening Cycle.

Rockies pipes managed gains of about a dime or slightly moredespite Williams Field Services reporting that flows from the Opal(WY) Plant had returned to the levels prevailing prior to lastThursday’s fire and explosion (see Daily GPI, Oct. 4). Opal was putting out about 625MMcf/d at the tailgate Monday after having been reduced to 430 MMcf/dFriday, a WFS spokesman said.

PG&E citygates saw one of the day’s largest rises of more than15 cents into the mid $3.00s as the utility declared a low-linepackOFO for today (see TransportationNotes). All California points realized double-digit priceincreases even with the state’s weather cooling off considerably fromlast week’s heated levels. A marketer said unscheduled maintenance onPG&E Gas Transmission-Northwest’s Station 14 may have caused gasto back up at Stanfield and contributed to the OFO. However, it wasdifficult to gauge how much impact, if any, that had because of NOVA’sABC constraint, he said.

A trader quoting Chicago in the mid $2.50s reported all threemajor utilities in the area being forced to buy intra-day gas dueto temperatures which only reached the mid 40s Sunday. Weather isexpected to warm up later this week, she said, but then cool offagain toward the weekend.

Gulf of Mexico producers warily watched shower and thunderstormactivity increase around a tropical disturbance in Mexico’s Bay ofCampeche. One weather service predicted the disturbance couldintensify into a tropical depression as early as Monday night. Italso noted other tropical disturbances in the central and easternAtlantic Ocean and said a tropical wave that had just left the WestAfrican coast was well organized.

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