Soaring

Soaring Rockies prices, with some pipes going up by more than $3 and topping $7 in their high-end quotes, led a cash market uprising at virtually all points Wednesday. Cold weather in northern market areas and Tuesday’s 32.3-cent gain by May futures were responsible for the general firmness.

High temperatures only in the teens sent demand soaring in New York City Monday, driving natural gas spot prices to a high of $60 at Transco Zone 6 in New York. The average came quite a bit lower at near $40 and the high wasn’t near its $72/MMBtu record set Jan. 14, 2004 — the average that day was $44.81. Nevertheless, prices at Zone 6 New York were up more than $24/MMBtu from daily spot prices on Friday. Most other Northeast points were up only $3-5 from Friday’s levels.

February settlement-day bears apparently went back into hibernation Tuesday as March natural gas futures broke back to the upside, soaring 80.3 cents to end the day at $7.740, and crude oil futures jumped $3/bbl.

Soaring power demand records far in excess of what was projected this year in many regions should be a wake up call that a new power market crisis could be developing right under our noses, according to a white paper from Pace Global Energy Services, a Fairfax, VA-based energy services and consulting firm.

Soaring construction costs are forcing producers to once again “pause” discussions with the Canadian government over the long-proposed Mackenzie Gas Project (MGP), an Imperial Oil Co. executive said Wednesday.

Major producers and large independents continued to report soaring earnings last week, with at least double-digit profit on higher commodity prices. Producers with operations in the Gulf of Mexico continued to feel the effect of hurricanes in the final quarter of the year, but several managed to overcome offshore losses with strong domestic drilling results.

Profit for exploration and production companies, which has been soaring for the past two years, may fall well short of the 21% forecasted again this year because of rising service costs and lower commodity prices, with shares of natural gas-focused exploration and production companies possibly showing a steep decline over the coming months, an energy analyst said in a new report.

The public outcry over soaring energy prices this winter should force Congress to take action to boost domestic supply of gas and oil either before the Christmas holiday or early next year, major energy association officials predicted on Friday.

Devastating storms in the third quarter jolted energy markets and sent natural gas prices soaring, but despite the upheaval in prices and the continuing entry of new investment bankers into the marketplace, natural gas trading in North America continues to stabilize and grow, up an estimated 4%, to 96.45 Bcf/d from 92.81 Bcf/d a year ago, according to NGI’s latest gas marketer survey.