Lower 48 Oil Production

Today's EIA Weekly Petroleum Report shows an unsurprising continuation of the upward production trend that suggests we will keep rising for some time, perhaps breaking 10 million barrels per day by year's end.

Nuclear Power Output Stabilizes, Near 2016 Levels

As we move through refueling and maintenance season, nuclear power output levels should continue to drop, but the outages have not outpaced 2016 by much so far.  April should see larger year-on-year differentials, at least that's what is expected.

High Gas Prices Take Toll on Power Burn Market Share in MISO

The most recent two days (March 25 and 26) are in RED below.  Not only are total gas demand levels quite low, they reflect a loss of market share to coal of about 10 points vs last year:

Nuclear Refueling Begins: Large Drop in US Nuclear Capacity Factor Over the Weekend

Nuclear power output capacity factor dropped from 88% to 82% over the weekend, as units came offline.  That improves the power burn potential for natural gas, and a full gas replacement of the lost nuclear output would see about 1BCFD more gas being burned today than on this day last year.  This imbalance is projected to persist for some time.

MISO Coal to Gas Switching Snapshot: March 2016 vs 2017

Load-adjusted, gas is averaging about 5 points of thermal marketshare below last year in March.

The slope is also different, with market-share varying more directly with overall thermal load size.  With lower demand anticipated as weather moderates in the back half of March, the market share loss should be more pronounced, since thermal demand in the 8-10 BCFE range is showing a gas share around 37%, vs last year at 43%.

Compounding this loss for natural gas is the higher wind output experienced in MISO.  Average daily wind output is 185 GWH this month, vs 135 last March.  That's a MASSIVE difference, displacing something on the order of 400 MMCF per day.  (The increased wind output isn't just in MISO either, it is big in SPP and ERCOT)