Injected

With the news that a bit more natural gas than had been expected was injected into storage for the week ending April 22, traders pushed June futures lower on Thursday morning, perhaps in an effort to align the newly minted prompt month with where the May contract terminated on Wednesday.

Physical natural gas for Friday delivery continued to cartwheel lower along with futures as a hat-trick of unsupportive weather forecasts, a weak power environment, and a hefty government inventory report relegated market bulls to the bench.

The Texas Senate has passed HB 2767, which is intended to encourage the recycling of wastewater from drilling and hydraulic fracturing operations for reuse rather than injection of the waste into disposal wells. The legislation aims to clear up legal ambiguities around responsibility for transferred drilling waste.

Marketed natural gas production of the top-five producing states — Texas, Louisiana, Wyoming, Oklahoma and Colorado — grew 7.5% last year, but their combined share of U.S. gas output fell slightly to about 65%, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA).

A consortium of environmental groups has filed a petition with a Wyoming district court, seeking to require the state Oil and Gas Conservation Commissions to disclose information about specific chemicals used in the hydraulic fracturing (fracking) of oil and natural gas wells that are being kept confidential for proprietary business reasons.

Oil and gas industry billionaire T. Boone Pickens and other investors injected another $150 million into the natural gas transportation fueling company Pickens founded, Clean Energy Fuels Corp., it was reported Thursday. Clean Energy’s CEO confirmed the additional capital for the gas transportation infrastructure company, which is based in Seal Beach, CA.

Natural gas futures traders essentially brushed off the bearish news Thursday morning from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) that 78 Bcf was injected into underground stores for the week ending Oct. 28. The injection was at the very top of industry estimates going into the report. December natural gas futures ended up adding 2.9 cents over Wednesday’s finish to close at $3.778.

Three global private investment firms have injected $150 million into Seal Beach, CA-based Clean Energy Fuels Corp., a provider of natural gas and fueling infrastructure for the transportation sector.

Natural gas futures declined about 8 cents following word from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) that 73 Bcf was injected into underground storage for the week ending Sept. 17. While the build paled in comparison to the previous week’s 103 Bcf addition, it did top both last year’s date-adjusted 67 Bcf build for the week and the five-year average build of 70 Bcf.