Lessened

Climate change impacts are lessened when power plants burn natural gas instead of coal, but the same is not necessarily true when vehicles burn natural gas instead of traditional fuels because methane leakage more than offsets the clean-burning benefits of gas, according to a methane leakage model developed by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and university researchers. However, the gas industry countered that the model relies on “outdated and incomplete” data.

Climate change impacts are lessened when power plants burn natural gas instead of coal, but the same is not necessarily true when vehicles burn natural gas instead of traditional fuels because methane leakage more than offsets the clean-burning benefits of gas, according to a methane leakage model developed by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and university researchers. However, the gas industry countered that the model relies on “outdated and incomplete” data.

Prices made small gains at most points Tuesday, nearly all of them in the East. Hot weather had lessened a bit since late last week but was still considerable enough with high forecasts on either side of 90 in the South, Northeast and parts of the Midwest and Rockies to keep power generation load fairly strong. The previous day’s 3.2-cent futures also contributed to cash strength.

Slight moderating trends in winter weather, weak futures and lessened industrial load over a weekend combined to send prices lower at nearly all points Friday.