U.S. Natural Gas Prices Rise 4% as Freeport LNG Restarts, Production Falls
5/7/2025 (Reuters) -- U.S. natural gas futures climbed about 4% on Wednesday on a drop in output and forecasts for demand to rise more than previously expected this week, especially with the return to service of Freeport LNG's export plant in Texas from an outage on Tuesday.
Gas futures for June delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose 12.9 cents, or 3.7%, to £3.492 per million British thermal units at 9:50 a.m. EDT.
Analysts said mild weather expected to last through late May should keep heating and cooling demand low, allowing utilities to continue injecting more gas into storage than normal for this time of year. Gas stockpiles were currently around 1% above the five-year normal. Inventories had been below normal from mid-January through late April after utilities pulled a monthly record 1.013 billion cubic feet of gas from storage in January to keep homes and businesses warm during extreme cold weather this winter.
Some analysts said mild weather and record output this spring could allow energy firms to add record amounts of gas into storage in May. The current all-time monthly injection high of 494 bcf was set in May 2015. Supply and Demand
Financial firm LSEG said average gas output in the Lower 48 U.S. states fell to 103.4 billion cubic feet per day so far in May, down from a monthly record of 105.8 Bcf/d in April. Since gas output hit a daily record high of 107.4 Bcf/d on April 18, production was on track to drop by around 5.5 Bcf/d to a preliminary 10-week low of 102.6 Bcf/d on Tuesday. Analysts have noted that preliminary data is often revised later in the day.
Meteorologists projected temperatures in the Lower 48 states would remain mostly warmer than normal through May 22. LSEG forecast average gas demand in the Lower 48, including exports, will slide from 96.7 Bcf/d this week to 94.2 Bcf/d next week. The forecast for this week was higher than LSEG's outlook on Tuesday, while its forecast for next week was lower.
The average amount of gas flowing to the eight big LNG export plants operating in the U.S. fell to 14.8 Bcf/d so far in May, down from a monthly record of 16.0 Bcf/d in April. On a daily basis, the shutdown of Freeport, which was due to a power interruption, and reductions at other plants caused LNG feedgas to drop to a 14-week low of 12.4 Bcf/d on Tuesday. LSEG said the amount of gas flowing to Freeport's 2.1-Bcf/d plant was on track to reach 1.8 Bcf/d on Wednesday, up from 0.3 Bcf/d on Tuesday and an average of 1.9 Bcf/d over the prior seven days.
The other LNG feedgas reductions were at Cameron LNG's 2.0-Bcf/d plant in Louisiana and Cheniere Energy's 3.9-Bcf/d Corpus Christi plant under construction and in operation in Texas. Gas flows to Cameron have held around 1.2 Bcf/d since Monday, down from an average of 1.8 Bcf/d over the prior seven days, while flows to Corpus have held around 1.5 Bcf/d since Tuesday, down from an average of 2.2 Bcf/d over the prior seven days. Officials at Cameron LNG have not commented on the feedgas reduction, while officials at Cheniere said they had no comment.
Both companies, however, have told customers in separate postings that they were conducting maintenance on pipelines and other equipment that supplies gas to their plants.
Energy traders noted that other than the Freeport shutdown, most of the feedgas reductions and pipeline[1] work were part of normal spring and autumn maintenance when demand for gas for heating and cooling is low.