News of higher temperatures to come in the next week, combine with lower production levels caused natural gas prices to spike up to a 13 year high Monday. At 5:00PM EST, Henry Hub natural gas July contracts had risen 9.91%, to $9.368. August contracts were up 9.87%, at $9.350.

EBW analyst Bill Rubin was quoted by Natural Gas Intelligence as saying in a note that a “blistering hot summer… could ignite another substantial rally in Nymex futures into mid-summer,” as it is used for cooling.

Texas particularly was expected to have historical demand for natural gas this week, and it is not even the hottest part of the summer there.

In addition, as demand rises, and production declines, exports of liquid natural gas are soaring from the US Gulf Coast to take advantage of higher prices overseas, diverting domestic supply.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission had predicted the demand for natural gas would outpace supply this summer in its 2022 outlook, released in May. It predicted a 3.4% increase in production over the summer months, compared to a 4.8% increase in consumption over the same period.

Consumption had already been outstripping supply. 2.264 billion cubic feet of natural gas was pulled out of US storage over the winter, from November of 2021, through March of 2022. That was 10% higher than the average of the previous five years. Already over the winter, US demand had exceeded supply by 14.9 billion cubic feet per day.