Eroding

Losses moderately outnumbered gains in Friday’s cash market as growth of heating load in the South was offset by still-substantial but eroding weather-based demand in the Northeast, Midwest/Midcontinent and Rockies.

Softer natural gas prices are eroding Canadian well numbers, but western drilling rigs are staying busy as the industry switches to targets requiring more work including deep supplies to bank for future use.

Softer natural gas prices are eroding Canadian well numbers, but western drilling rigs are staying busy as the industry switches to targets requiring more work including deep supplies to bank for future use.

With little or no air-conditioning related demand on the horizon and amid a quickly eroding year-on-year storage deficit, natural gas futures slumped to new 9-month lows Monday as traders pressed the market’s downside yet again. After opening lower, the June contract was hit with a steady procession of commercial and speculative selling that took the market down to a previous low at $4.10 just before the closing bell. Unable to rebound, June closed just off that level at $4.113, down 17.3 cents for the day.

Eroding gains achieved in the overnight Access trading session, natural gas futures trickled lower Tuesday as neither bull nor bear was willing or able to propel the May contract outside of its recent trading range. Closing at $5.115, the May contract finished 5.5 cents off its opening trade, but 1.2 cents above Monday’s settle.

California utilities’ eroding creditworthiness is extendingbeyond the electricity sector and seeping into the naturalgas-buying parts of their business as well, according to a PacificGas and Electric Co. witness testifying Friday in the ongoing stateemergency rate hearings.