NEW YORK: US natural gas futures climbed about 3percent on Thursday on near-record flows to liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plants and ahead of a federal storage report expected to show energy firms pulled much more gas out of storage last week to meet surging heating demand during an Arctic blast for a second week in a row.
Gas futures for March delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose 9.5 cents, or 3.3percent, to USD3.254 per million British thermal units (mmBtu).
After pulling a record 360 billion cubic feet (bcf) of gas from storage during the week ended January 30, analysts forecast energy firms pulled a still massive 257 bcf of gas from storage during the week ended February 6.
That compares with a decline of 111 bcf during the same week last year and an average withdrawal of 146 bcf over the past five years (2021-2025).
In the cash market, meanwhile, average prices at the Waha Hub in the Permian Basin in West Texas remained in negative territory for a sixth day in a row and the 15th time this year, as pipeline constraints trapped gas in the nation’s biggest oil-producing basin.
Daily Waha prices first fell below zero in 2019. They did so 17 times in 2019, six times in 2020, once in 2023, a record 49 times in 2024, and 39 times in 2025.
Waha prices have averaged USD1.40 per mmBtu so far this year, compared with USD1.15 in 2025 and a five-year average (2021-2025) of USD2.88.
Financial firm LSEG said average gas output in the Lower 48 states climbed to 107.6 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) so far in February, up from 106.3 bcfd in January. That figure compares with a monthly record high of 109.7 bcfd in December.
After extreme cold over the past couple of weeks, meteorologists projected weather across much of the country would remain mostly warmer than normal through at least February 27.
With last week’s storage withdrawal, stockpiles will likely drop from around 1percent below normal levels for this time of year during the week ended January 30 to around 6percent below normal during the week ended February 6.
Energy analysts, however, noted mild weather expected over the next few weeks could wipe out much of that storage deficit by early March.
LSEG projected average gas demand in the Lower 48 states, including exports, would fall from 141.3 bcfd this week to 124.0 bcfd next week. The forecast for next week was lower than LSEG’s outlook on Wednesday.
Average gas flows to the eight large US LNG export plants have risen to 18.5 bcfd so far in February, up from 17.8 bcfd in January. That reading compares with a monthly record high of 18.5 bcfd in December.