Short-Term Energy Outlook

Natural Gas

The Henry Hub natural gas spot price averaged $2.95/million British thermal units (MMBtu) in March, up 26 cents/MMBtu from February. Prices increased as a result of colder-than-normal temperatures across much of the United States, which increased the use of natural gas for space heating. EIA expects strong growth in U.S. natural gas production to put downward pressure on prices in 2019 and in 2020. EIA expects Henry Hub natural gas spot prices will average $2.82/MMBtu in 2019, down 33 cents/MMBtu from 2018. The forecasted 2020 Henry Hub spot price is $2.77/MMBtu.

EIA forecasts that dry natural gas production will average 91.0 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) in 2019, up 7.6 Bcf/d from 2018. EIA expects natural gas production will continue to grow in 2020 to an average of 92.5 Bcf/d.

EIA estimates that natural gas inventories ended March at 1.2 trillion cubic feet (Tcf), which would be 17% lower than levels from a year earlier and 30% lower than the five-year (2014–18) average. EIA forecasts that natural gas storage injections will outpace the previous five-year average during the April-through-October injection season and that inventories will reach 3.7 Tcf at the end of October, which would be 13% higher than October 2018 levels but 1% lower than the five-year average.

U.S. Natural Gas Summary
	2017	2018	2019projected	2020projected
Prices	(dollars per thousand cubic feet)
Henry Hub Spot	3.10	3.27	2.92	2.88
Residential Sector	10.86	10.48	10.55	10.91
Commercial Sector	7.86	7.82	7.87	7.84
Industrial Sector	4.10	4.20	4.04	4.00
Supply	(billion cubic feet per day)
Marketed Production	79.99	89.68	97.83	99.62
Dry Gas Production	74.77	83.39	91.00	92.47
Pipeline Imports	8.12	7.77	7.53	7.31
LNG Imports	0.21	0.21	0.22	0.22
Consumption	(billion cubic feet per day)
Residential Sector	12.09	13.65	13.88	13.23
Commercial Sector	8.67	9.54	9.59	9.14
Industrial Sector	21.78	22.70	23.49	23.66
Electric Power Sector	25.39	29.11	29.88	30.69
Total Consumption	74.32	82.11	84.61	84.76
Primary Assumptions	(percent change from previous year)
Heating Degree Days	-1.3	11.8	-0.6	-2.2
Cooling Degree Days	-8.3	10.9	-13.5	0.5
Commercial Employment	1.7	1.6	1.9	1.3
Natural-gas-weighted Industrial Production	2.9	2.7	3.1	1.7

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Related Figures
Henry Hub natural gas price	XLSX	PNG
U.S. natural gas prices	XLSX	PNG
U.S. marketed natural gas production	XLSX	PNG
U.S. natural gas consumption	XLSX	PNG
U.S. natural gas balance	XLSX	PNG
U.S. natural gas trade	XLSX	PNG
U.S. working natural gas in storage	XLSX	PNG
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U.S. carbon dioxide emissions growth	XLSX	PNG
U.S. winter heating degree days	XLSX	PNG
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