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Natural gas usage worldwide will climb faster than any other energy source over the next 23 years, according to the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) International Energy Outlook. Natural gas consumption is projected to increase 2.3% per year, or a total of 69%, through 2025 to 156 Tcf from 92 Tcf in 2002.

Prices for the last four days of May fell across the board Friday. As a source had predicted, the market weakened under the pressure of milder weather trends, Thursday’s expiration-day drop of 19.2 cents in June futures, a second straight bearish storage report and the greater loss of industrial load associated with a holiday weekend.

El Paso Corp. officials were trying Wednesday afternoon to determine whether their ANR Pipeline or another pipe was the source of a rupture late Tuesday night near ANR’s Custer Compressor Station in Oklahoma. No injuries were reported, and a small fire that was still burning at the site through midday Wednesday was out that afternoon, an El Paso spokesman said.

The cash market recorded solid rebounds at all points Thursday in what one source said was more a response to the previous day’s strength throughout Nymex’s energy futures complex than to any underlying fundamental support. A majority of gains were in the teens, with an overall range from about a nickel to a quarter.

Reliance on natural gas is a steadily escalating source of financial pain for oilsands complexes. Alberta’s three oilsands mining and bitumen upgrading complexes spent a total of C$692 million (US$520 million) on gas in 2003, or five times what they spent in 1999, according to the Calgary energy investment firm of Peters & Co. Ltd.

“It’s beginning to look a lot like summer.” Christmas may still be six months away, but forgive one source for being reminded of a holiday carol in assessing why cash prices spiked across the board Tuesday.

Natural gas and propane were the preferred source of home heating for seven of every 10 single-family homes built in 2003, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s latest “Characteristics of Housing” report. The study also found that gas was also the choice for a majority of multi-family homes built that year.

Natural gas and propane were the preferred source of home heating for seven of every 10 single-family homes built in 2003, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s latest “Characteristics of Housing” report. The study also found that gas was also the choice for a majority of multi-family homes built that year.

Natural gas is the fastest growing primary energy source in the world and gas demand is projected to grow by 2.4% per year through 2020 as its share of worldwide energy use shoots up to 25% of the total from its current level of about 20%, said Scott Nauman, gas marketing manager for the Americas at ExxonMobil.