Scare

The gas market, particularly in the Northeast, got a little scare last week when striking tugboat workers shut down liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipments from Trinidad, the largest LNG exporter to the United States, for two days.

After creating a pretty good scare for Gulf of Mexico producers at the end of last week, Tropical Storm Erika remained just that, a tropical storm, failing to reach hurricane status as it made landfall Saturday approximately 30 miles south of Brownsville, TX on the edge of the Mexican border city of Matamoros.

Increasing natural gas prices should not scare Congress into allowing greedy gas producers to drill willy-nilly across environmentally sensitive areas or areas currently blocked by drilling moratoria, environmentalists, ranchers, public interest groups and scientists said last Wednesday during a teleconference on the “real story behind the natural gas crisis.”

Increasing natural gas prices should not scare Congress into allowing greedy gas producers to drill willy-nilly across environmentally sensitive areas or areas currently blocked by drilling moratoria, environmentalists, ranchers, public interest groups and scientists said on Wednesday during a teleconference on the “real story behind the natural gas crisis.” The conference was organized by the Community Office for Resource Efficiency (CORE), the Northern Plains Resource Council and The Wilderness Society.

Amid deepening fears that the U.S. economy is headed for a recession, and exacerbated by light trading volume following a bomb threat at Nymex, natural gas futures tumbled to new 19-month lows Tuesday, as institutional traders increased their short exposure. Almost uniform selling was seen across the entire strip of contracts, pressuring the winter strip down 15 cents to $2.99 and the 12-month strip down 13 cents to $2.97. The October contract closed at $2.225, down 14.4 cents for the session.