The pull was 72 Bcf, in line with Bloomberg's poll. I didn't see Platts' but yesterday we were hearing 74, down from 76.
Nuke outages continue to support the price but that will change as early as next month. As I said
last week:
...Nuclear outages have declined dramatically from over 30,000 MW at the
end of October to 11,900 currently, still above the 5-year but if you
remember the Platts story of three weeks ago quite a few operators
were/are doing their refueling over the Dec-Jan period rather than the
spring shoulder which means the nukes will be cooking during the Feb-Apr
time-frame....
Outages are at 10,300 MW which is 40% above the five year average.
The new front futures are up 6 cents at $3.48 and not looking especially exuberant.
From
the EIA:
Released: December 28, 2012 at 10:30 a.m. (eastern time) for the Week Ending December 21, 2012.
Next Release: January 4, 2013
| Working Gas in Underground Storage, Lower 48 |
other formats: Summary TXT CSV |
| Region |
Stocks in billion cubic feet (Bcf) |
Historical Comparisons |
| 12/21/12 |
12/14/12 |
Change |
Year Ago (12/21/11) |
5-Year (2007-2011) Average |
| Stocks (Bcf) |
% Change |
Stocks (Bcf) |
% Change |
| East |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| West |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Producing |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Total |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Summary
Working gas in storage was 3,652 Bcf as of Friday, December 21, 2012,
according to EIA estimates. This represents a net decline of 72 Bcf from the previous week.
Stocks were 81 Bcf higher than last year at this time and 413 Bcf above
the 5-year average of 3,239 Bcf. In the East Region, stocks were 129 Bcf above
the 5-year average following net withdrawals of 42 Bcf. Stocks in the Producing Region were 203 Bcf above
the 5-year average of 1,046 Bcf after
a net withdrawal of 12 Bcf. Stocks in the West Region
were 81 Bcf above the 5-year average after a net drawdown of 18 Bcf. At 3,652 Bcf,
total working gas is above the 5-year historical range.
Working gas stocks in the Producing Region, for the week ending
December 21, 2012, totaled 1,249 Bcf, with 310 Bcf in salt cavern
facilities and 939 Bcf in nonsalt cavern facilities. Working gas stocks
decreased 2 Bcf in the salt cavern facilities and decreased 10 in the
nonsalt cavern facilities since December 14. An historical series of the
salt and nonsalt subtotals of the Producing Region is available for
download at:
wngsr_producing_region_salt.xls.
