The price of gas continues to rise, closing yesterday up 7 cents at $2.50/MMBtu. With above average temperatures across most of the US, the market should continue to grow as the summer cooling season begins. Currently gas is trading up 6 cents at $2.56/MMBtu.

The extremely low natural gas prices from Q1 2012 severely affected the use of coal fired generation during the early stages of the year. Coal powered generation was down to 36% of the total power mix in Q1 compared to 44% in Q1 2011. As gas prices begin to rise we shall see how coal is affected in the coming months. [...]

The EIA reported a 28 Bcf build in natural gas storage for the week ending 4/27/2012, on the low end of analyst predictions of a build in the 25 to 65 Bcf range. Working gas in storage was 2,576 Bcf as of Friday, 840 Bcf higher than last year’s 1,736 Bcf stock and 857 Bcf above the 5-year average of 1,719 Bcf. [...]

Since our last report posted on April 24th, Natural Gas prices seemed to get touched by Lazarus as prices momentarily broke below the key 2.00 level only to bounce all the way back up to and slightly above the long term low set in August 2009 at 2.40 MMBTU. While a counter trend rally of some sort was expected after such ferocious downside action, it will take a lot more upside movement to convince traders and investors to reposition for a Long Term bullish Change In Trend. [...]

In Pennsylvania, rate caps in the PECO, MetEd, Penelac and Allegheny service territories expired on January 1, 2011. We continue to see robust supplier competition and companies throughout the state can realize significant savings. [...]