As a whole, Atlantic Basin storage levels are again lagging year-ago and three-year-average levels due to a North American deficit that outweighs West European surpluses to historic levels, even though storage in those European markets is now nearly 92% full on a weighted average basis, at 67.5 billion cubic meters (2.38 trillion cubic feet) (see table below). Market factors including the unusually high nuclear reactor outages that boost gas-fired generation and strong weather-related demand over the summer have apparently killed any hope for a new US storage record this year. Analyst Ron Denhardt forecasts that, despite continually growing production and a stagnate economy, US storage should enter winter at around 3.7 Tcf, 147 billion cubic feet under last year (WGI Sep.7'11,p6).
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