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Natural gas production in the northeastern United States has grown rapidly since 2009, thanks to increased drilling in the Marcellus Shale, according to data released by the Energy Information Administration (EIA) Tuesday.

Not surprisingly, the modest rally of the previous two days came to an end Thursday as generally moderate weather, prior-day futures weakness and a demand-killing hurricane ganged up to cause spot prices to decline across the board.

September natural gas traded lower, then higher Thursday as traders noted that the latest storage figure came in pretty much on target. September rose 0.9 cent to $3.931 and October gained 1.7 cents to $3.906. October crude oil rose 14 cents to $85.30/bbl.

The fickle nature of weather trends came into play in the gas market again Friday as hot weekend forecasts for much of the U.S. and even extending into parts of central and Eastern Canada generated rallies at a large majority of points. The previous day’s 2.5-cent futures loss following a moderately bearish storage report and the usual weekend decline of industrial load had relatively minimal impact.

Chevron Corp. CEO John Watson on Wednesday found himself face to face with some rambunctious activists who came to the annual shareholder meeting in San Ramon, CA, to voice their opposition to the oil major’s global drilling practices. In the end, however, the company’s majority shareholders won the day, turning back resolutions that included calling for more disclosure about hydraulic fracturing (hydrofracking).

Shale gas plays gained 14 active rigs to 964 rigs in the week ended April 29 over the previous week’s 950 rigs for a 1% increase, but the total was a 2% decrease from the 981 rigs active a month ago for the week ending April 1, according to NGI’s Shale Daily Unconventional Rig Count.

Florida Gas Transmission’s (FGT) Phase VIII Expansion was placed in service Friday as scheduled, according to Houston-based Southern Union Co. The announcement came one week after the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) gave FGT the green light to place into service the remaining facilities associated with the $2.48 expansion to serve gas-fired power generators and utilities in Florida (see Daily GPI, March 28). The project, which FERC approved in November 2009, adds more than 483 miles of pipeline loops, laterals and mainline and installs 213,600 hp of compression at eight existing stations and one new station (see Daily GPI, Nov. 20, 2009). The project also called for FGT to acquire the existing 22.7-mile Martin Lateral from Florida Power & Light Co. (FPL), which will serve power plants in Manatee, Martin, Miami-Dade and Suwannee counties, FL. The Phase VIII Expansion is intended to create 820,000 MMBtu/d of capacity on FGT’s system from Alabama to Florida. The expansion’s Phase I facilities, which involved the construction and operation of facilities to serve FPL’s Manatee Power Plant, went into service in mid-2010. FGT proposes to transport gas to five other shippers: Florida Power Corp./Progress Energy Florida Inc.; Seminole Electric Cooperative Inc.; Tampa Electric Co.; the Orlando Utilities Commission; and the City of Tallahassee.

It wasn’t a complete upturn, but the hints in the previous day’s market that a lessening of overall weakness might lead to a general rally Thursday came to fruition. Abetted by the May futures increase of 9.2 cents Wednesday and a rather slow easing of cold weather in much of the northern U.S. and Canada, a mixed market saw gains outnumbering losses.

April natural gas futures drifted lower Monday as traders continue to focus on a rangebound market and see no compelling reason for prices at current elevated levels. At the close April futures eased seven-tenths of a cent to $4.161 and May slid five-tenths of a cent to $4.241. April crude oil vaulted $1.26 to $102.33/bbl.