Amidst the concern over relatively elevated crude oil prices, natural gas prices continued their slump yesterday after governmental data showed volumes in gas storage rose more than expected last week. The news pushed futures contracts for June delivery down to $5.997 per million British thermal units on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the first time that the price for such contracts had dipped under $6 per BTU since February, 2005. Gas futures are now down 47% for the year and 65% below their December high, which was a Nymex record.
The Energy Information Administration reported yesterday that total gas in underground storage rose by 91 billion cubic feet, which is almost eight billion cubic feet more than previous estimates. Volumes in storage as of May 12 totaled 2.08 trillion cubic feet, the highest ever for this time of year. Some analysts are speculating that the U.S. could actually run out of storage space if the current trends continue.
Still no word from Bill O’Reilly on how the big oil and gas companies allowed such a situation to occur.
Houston's Clear Thinkers
Longtime Houston attorney Tom Kirkendall's observations on developments in law, business, medicine, culture, sports, and other matters of general interest to the Houston business, professional, and academic communities.
I can’t remember the aid trucks with clothes and food coming into New Orleans when the price of oil hit 7$ a barrel from 27$. They com(passion) seems only to exist one way. There was no coverage of the vast consumer conspiracy keeping gas prices low and oil workers unemployed