Natural Gas Price Surges as Arctic Blast Grips NE

{Editor's note: I've posted an article Don't Blame Renewables for Your High Utility Bills detailing how Natural Gas is the culprit not Renewables as some talk show hosts and politicians would have you believe.}

"US natural gas continued to extend eye-popping gains,  as freezing weather sweeps across much of the country, boosting heating demand and disrupting supplies.

Front-month futures settled up 28.9%, or by $1.525, to $6.80 per million British thermal units, the highest closing price and the largest single-day gain since 2022. The February contract reached as high as $7.384 per million Btu in volatile intraday trading, a whopping 40% higher than the closing price on Friday. The more actively traded March contract settled up 8% to $3.898 per million Btu.

Meanwhile, gas for near-term physical delivery at the US benchmark Henry Hub in Louisiana traded as high as $53 per million Btu, according to traders. In the chilly Northeast, cash prices at the Iroquois Zone 2 hub were trading over $200 per million Btu, traders said.

The winter storm is estimated to have knocked offline 12% of US natural gas production, just as demand for the heating and power-plant fuel jumped. The big freeze has strained electricity grids and crippled transportation, grounding thousands of flights."