US natural gas futures settled a notch higher on Wednesday, supported by late summer warmth that could bump up demand for air conditioning run on gas-fired electricity. Front-month gas futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange settled up 0.8 cents, or 0.3 percent, at $2.693 per million British thermal units. The contract hit a near 2-1/2-month low of $2.624 on Monday on concerns that cooler weather was putting a quick end to the summer demand for air conditioning.
After swings in weather forecasts over the past week, Maryland-based MDA Weather Services said on Wednesday its readings showed consistently warmer conditions across most of the United States over the next six to 10 days. "The only region seeing temperatures on the cool side of normal is in the West, and the risk is that the West Coast may be cooler while elsewhere is hotter still," it said.
The latest Global Forecast System weather model projected 155.5 population-weighted cooling degree days over the next two weeks for the lower 48 US states, little changed from Tuesday's forecast of 158.1 CDDs. Estimates from a Reuters poll indicated that US utilities added 59 billion cubic feet of gas into storage for the week ended August 21. The US Energy Information Administration will issue official gas inventory data on Thursday. In its last report, the EIA said 53 bcf was added to storage for the week ended August 14. The Reuters poll had called for a build of 58 bcf for that week.
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