Friday, March 12, 2021

The market at work, with dollar store clothes and propane torches

Via the always excellent Polymerist Substack, this amusing article: 
HOUSTON (Bloomberg) --Chris Bird first saw the rumors Friday morning on Twitter.

Physical natural gas prices were soaring in Oklahoma amid a cold blast that was gripping much of the U.S. and only stood to get worse. Bird, owner of a small gas producer in Tulsa, called one trader who confirmed the heating fuel was going for a staggering $350 per million British thermal units. Then he called another who said it had risen to $395.

That’s all Bird needed to know. He and his production technician grabbed some winter clothes at the dollar store and drove the stretch of highway to Osage County some 20 miles north. They met up with a buddy who owns a propane torch and began melting ice off idled gas wells to get them back online.

“We’ve got four of us in the office turning on every single gas well that we’ve got,” Bird said. “We have old wells that haven’t produced in 10 years, and we’re like, ‘open the taps, let’s go.’”

I imagine that the demand for natural gas is going down a bit, but it's always interesting to see what high commodity prices will get people to do. 

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looks like Blogger doesn't work with anonymous comments from Chrome browsers at the moment - works in Microsoft Edge, or from Chrome with a Blogger account - sorry! CJ 3/21/20