Natural Gas 09:36 AM EDT, 07/02/2021 (MT Newswires) -- Benchmark natural gas rose to a fresh 30-month high as hot weather continues to support cooling demand while inventories remain well below average on weak supply.
Gas for August delivery was last seen up US$0.01 to US$3.67 per million British thermal units.
The rise came a day after the Energy Information Administration reported inventories last week rose by 76-billion cubic feet, above the consensus estimate for a 68-bcf rise.
"Despite the larger than normal build, inventories sit at a 6% deficit to the 5-year average. As temperatures have soared over the past week, we see the build having little to no impact on prices as power gen is currently up +~5bcfd w/w," Tudor, Pickering & Holt said in a note.
Hotter than normal weather is expected to continue for most of the northern and western states over the next two weeks, keeping demand high.
"National demand will increase next week due to hot conditions over the West and warm conditions over the South and East. Although, there were cooler trends overall due to the weather system across the Great Lakes and Northeast," NatGasWeather noted.