April 17 (Reuters) - U.S. natural gas futures jumped about 9% to a three-week high on Monday on forecasts for cooler weather and more heating demand over the next two weeks than previously expected.

Prices were also rising as the amount of gas flowing to U.S. liquefied natural gas $(LNG)$ export plants remained on track to hit a record high for a second month in a row in April after Freeport LNG's export plant in Texas exited an eight-month outage in February.

Front-month gas futures for May delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange were up 18 cents, or 8.5%, to $2.294 per million British thermal units (mmBtu) at 9:33 a.m. EDT (1333 GMT), putting the contract on track for its highest close since March 21.

That would be the front-month's biggest daily percentage gain since it rose 11.4% on Feb. 27.

With prices up 5% last week, gas speculators reduced their net short futures and options positions on the New York Mercantile and Intercontinental Exchanges to their lowest since late March, according to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission's Commitments of Traders report.

Two weeks ago when gas prices fell about 9%, those speculators boosted their net shorts for the first time in six weeks.

In the spot market, meanwhile, next-day gas for Monday at the Henry Hub benchmark in Louisiana fell to $1.87 per mmBtu, its lowest since October 2020.

Freeport LNG's export plant, which shut in June 2022 after a fire, was on track to keep pulling in about 2.2 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) of gas on Monday, the same as its two-week average, according to data provider Refinitiv.

That was above the 2.1 bcfd of gas Freeport LNG can turn into LNG for export. LNG plants can pull in more gas than they can turn into LNG because they use some of the fuel to power equipment used to produce LNG.

Average gas flows to all seven big U.S. LNG export plants have risen to 14.0 bcfd so far in April, up from a record 13.2 bcfd in March.

The seven big U.S. LNG export plants can turn about 13.8 bcfd of gas into LNG.

SUPPLY AND DEMAND

Refinitiv said average gas output in the U.S. Lower 48 states had risen to 100.1 bcfd so far in April, up from 99.7 bcfd in March. That compares with a monthly record of 100.4 bcfd in January.

Meteorologists projected the weather in the Lower 48 states would remain mostly colder than normal from April 17-25 before turning near normal from April 26-May 2.

With the weather expected to remain cooler for longer, Refinitiv forecast U.S. gas demand, including exports, would rise from 94.1 bcfd this week to 94.8 bcfd next week.

Mostly mild weather during the winter of 2022-2023 allowed utilities to leave more gas in storage than usual.

Gas stockpiles were about 19% above their five-year average (2018-2022) during the week ended April 7 and were expected to end about 23% above normal during the warmer-than-normal week ended April 14, according to federal data and analysts' estimates.

Week ended Week ended Year ago Five-year

Apr Apr Apr 14 average

14(Forecast 7(Actual) Apr 14

)

U.S. weekly natgas storage change (bcf): 65 25 47 41

U.S. total natgas in storage (bcf): 1,920 1,855 1,395 1,560

U.S. total storage versus 5-year average 23.1% 18.9%

Global Gas Benchmark Futures ($ per mmBtu) Current Day Prior Day This Month Prior Year Five Year

Last Year Average Average

2022 (2018-2022)

Henry Hub 2.16 2.11 6.70 6.54 3.60

Title Transfer Facility $(TTF)$ 13.51 13.23 31.83 40.50 14.39

Japan Korea Marker (JKM) 12.68 12.60 29.22 34.11 14.31

Refinitiv Heating $(HDD.UK)$, Cooling $(CDD.AU)$ and Total (TDD) Degree Days

Two-Week Total Forecast Current Day Prior Day Prior Year 10-Year 30-Year

Norm Norm

U.S. GFS HDDs 140 117 154 134 132

U.S. GFS CDDs 41 41 44 42 37

U.S. GFS TDDs 158 158 198 176 180

Refinitiv U.S. Weekly GFS Supply and Demand Forecasts

Prior Week Current Next Week This Week Five-Year

Week Last Year Average For

Month

U.S. Supply (bcfd)

U.S. Lower 48 Dry Production 100.3 100.1 100.3 95.5 89.7

U.S. Imports from Canada 6.6 6.8 7.1 9.1 8.6

U.S. LNG Imports 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1

Total U.S. Supply 106.9 107.0 107.4 104.6 98.4

U.S. Demand (bcfd)

U.S. Exports to Canada 2.2 2.0 2.1 2.7 2.6

U.S. Exports to Mexico 4.7 5.0 4.9 5.9 5.1

U.S. LNG Exports 13.9 14.4 13.7 12.2 7.1

U.S. Commercial 7.8 6.9 7.0 9.2 8.7

U.S. Residential 10.2 8.8 8.7 12.9 12.5

U.S. Power Plant 29.3 28.7 29.8 25.4 24.9

U.S. Industrial 21.5 21.3 21.5 22.6 22.5

U.S. Plant Fuel 5.0 4.9 5.0 4.9 4.9

U.S. Pipe Distribution 2.0 1.9 2.0 1.9 2.4

U.S. Vehicle Fuel 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1

Total U.S. Consumption 75.8 72.8 74.1 77.0 76.0

Total U.S. Demand 96.6 94.1 94.8 97.8 90.8

U.S. weekly power generation percent by fuel - EIA

Week ended Week ended Week ended Week ended Week ended

Apr 21 Apr 14 Apr 7 Mar 31 Mar 24

Wind 16 15 16 14 14

Solar 5 5 4 4 3

Hydro 7 7 7 7 7

Other 2 2 2 2 2

Petroleum 0 0 0 0 0

Natural Gas 38 38 38 39 37

Coal 14 14 15 16 17

Nuclear 19 19 19 19 18

SNL U.S. Natural Gas Next-Day Prices ($ per mmBtu)

Hub Current Day Prior Day

Henry Hub 1.87 2.04

Transco Z6 New York 1.35 1.35

PG&E Citygate 5.04 5.07

Eastern Gas (old Dominion South) 1.31 1.31

Chicago Citygate 1.64 1.56

Algonquin Citygate 1.50 1.35

SoCal Citygate 7.50 8.22

Waha Hub 1.16 1.35

AECO 1.49 1.58

SNL U.S. Power Next-Day Prices ($ per megawatt-hour)

Hub Current Day Prior Day

New England 28.50 36.50

PJM West 30.75 35.25

Ercot North 17.75 22.25

Mid C 115.00 113.86

Palo Verde 30.25 42.75

SP-15 32.00 40.50

(Reporting by Scott DiSavino Editing by Mark Potter)

((scott.disavino@thomsonreuters.com; +1 332 219 1922; Reuters Messaging: scott.disavino.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))

((For Refinitiv type ENERGY in Eikon search bar and then go to the GAS drop down and the NORTH AMERICA drop down or see: cpurl://apps.cp./cms/?pageid=usa-gas For Interactive Map, type 'Interactive Map' in the box at upper left of the Reuters nEiko terminal. For graphics on Baker Hughes rig counts, see: For next-day SNL U.S. gas prices, see: For next-day SNL U.S. power prices, see: For U.S. natgas price and storage polls, see: For U.S. nuclear power outages, see: For U.S. Northwest hydro power report, see: For U.S./Canada natural gas rig count vs Henry Hub futures price, see: For the U.S. natural gas speed guide, see: For the U.S. power speed guide, see: To determine CFTC managed money net position add (NYMEX Henry Hub options and futures combined ) plus (ICE Henry Hub options and futures combined divided by four) plus (NYMEX Henry Hub swaps options and futures combined divided by four) plus (NYMEX Henry Hub penultimate gas swaps divided by four) NYMEX Henry Hub options and futures combined NYMEX Henry Hub futures only ICE Henry Hub options and futures combined NYMEX Henry Hub swaps options and futures combined NYMEX Henry Hub Penultimate gas swaps ))