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The December wholesale exchange contract was slightly higher on Friday as the warm forecasts for natural gas came in from the meteorologist’s. The natural gas market was higher throughout Friday morning and then around the lunch hour, the forecaster’s weather models continued to show continued warm expected temperatures, the wholesale contract lost steam and settled at $3.778 on the day, up $0.029. It seems old man winter is having a hard time getting started this winter due to the barrage of supplies from the shale regions and warm weather. Meteorologists haven’t changed their story yet on December through February and they are still forecasting for colder than normal temperatures in the major population weighed areas in the Midwest, Northeast and Southeast. On the EIA storage front, gas storage levels are forecasts are coming around the 40 Bcf level this past week ending on Friday, November 4th amid a pickup in heating demand and lower supply than the week before.
In the, “how do I defer this criticism category”, the majority of Connecticut's delegation is asking the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to look into whether Connecticut Light & Power and Northeast Utilities violated the Energy Policy Act by restoring power to other Northeast states more quickly than to Connecticut following a late October storm. Also Friday, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said a consulting firm headed by former Federal Emergency Management Authority Director James Lee Whit has offered to do a pro bono study of CL&P and UI and their preparedness for the storm; it will be ready for state review by Dec. 1. Also Friday, the Obama administration approved more assistance for Connecticut to help towns with debris removal after the storm leveled five times the number of trees toppled by Hurricane Irene. The funds will cover overtime, equipment and fuel associated with the removal. Towns had held off hiring contractors until they had some assurance that costs would be reimbursed. The governor also made it clear Friday that there is likely to be a major change in the tree trimming policy in Connecticut. "You can't have it both ways: You can't be a state that has less impact due to high winds or storms and have the degree of foliage along highways and byways that we currently have." "We have too many trees alongside of roads that also have wires adjacent to them. We are going to have to do something about that. Mark my words, when we start to do that, there are going to be people wrapping themselves around trees," he predicted. At its peak, the freak snowstorm cut the power to 670,000 households in Massachusetts, with all but 85,000 restored as of Friday; New Hampshire had 315,000 households in the dark at the beginning, while 6,300 have yet to be restored. In Connecticut, 282,000 customers remained without power as of Friday evening, but CL&P continues to predict that the number will be reduced to 200,000 by early today and 100,000 early Sunday, with 99 percent of customers restored by midnight Sunday.
In lone star state this morning, most Texans have been enjoying relatively low electricity rates in recent years, but prices are expected to rise in the next couple of years as the cost of natural gas increases and power supplies tighten, experts said Thursday. "Just tell them to lock in prices" for one or two years, one consultant indicated before an audience of electricity retailers and brokers at the Texas Electricity Professionals Association's annual conference in Dallas. Still, electric rates in the state's deregulated markets aren't expected to return to the extremely high levels of 2008. Many electricity retailers offer one-year fixed-rate contracts for 8 to 9 cents per kilowatt-hour. Some predictions are that electricity prices could rise about 10 percent in both 2012 and 2013. Other speakers also warned of higher prices, citing the state's narrowing reserve margin of power supply over anticipated demand.
During the summer heat wave, ERCOT set a record for electricity demand on three consecutive days in August, peaking Aug. 3 at more than 68,000 megawatts. As a result, Doggett said, ERCOT saw its reserve margin fall from a projected 17.5 percent to 3.8 percent. While the system was strained by the high temperatures and some unexpected plant shutdowns, concerns are that the state's relatively low electric rates aren't motivating power generators to add generating capacity to meet growing demand. In the state's deregulated market, which includes much of North Texas not served by a municipal or cooperative power company, generators earn money only when they sell power. Other speakers suggested that the state consider modifying its deregulated market to include so-called capacity payments, in which a generator is paid a set amount to maintain a certain amount of spare capacity for emergencies. Doggett said ERCOT is also studying ways to get more large power users to agree to contracts that allow for power interruptions during periods of short supply. One approach being explored would expand programs that offer lower rates to big electricity users in exchange for agreeing to reduce their usage during periods of acute shortage.
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