| U.S., UK gird for frigid weekend |
Updated at: 0157 PST, Saturday, January 09, 2010 LONDON: Electricity use in Texas hit a winter high and orange-juice futures rose by an exchange limit today as the U.S. Northeast and South girded for a frigid weekend. Europe braced for more snow.“A good chunk of the country has been feeling the chill the last one to two weeks,” Tom Kines, a senior meteorologist at AccuWeather Inc., said in a telephone interview from State College, Pennsylvania. “The number of record lows set in the past week, there’s been 400 of them. That’s pretty significant to have that many of them over a week.” Cold from the Midwest is bound for the Northeast, he said. “It will not be as brutal as it’s been in the Midwest with wind chills of 30 below zero and temperatures at zero,” said Kines. “Nevertheless, temperatures will be below normal.” Florida’s orange growers escaped with minimal damage from freezes earlier this week. The weekend forecast is for lower temperatures, in the middle 20s Fahrenheit (about minus-3.8 Celsius) in central Florida, putting about a quarter of the citrus belt at risk, Larry Heitkemper, vice president of MDA EarthSat Weather, said in a statement. If farmers take precautions, “we expect overall citrus production losses will be low,” he said. Orange-juice futures for March delivery gained 8.45 cents, or 6 percent, to $1.496 a pound at 11:03 a.m. on the ICE Futures U.S. exchange in New York, after earlier rising the bourse’s 10- cent limit to $1.5115, the highest price since Jan. 2, 2008. The Florida crop is the largest after Brazil’s. Hog futures rose for the fourth time this week on signs that meatpackers are paying more for animals as subzero temperatures in the Midwest discourage U.S. producers from transporting the hogs. Winds in Iowa, the largest hog-producing state, may make it feel as cold as minus-35 degrees Fahrenheit today, according to the National Weather Service. Hog futures for February settlement rose 0.125 cent, or 0.2 percent, to 67.225 cents a pound at 9:28 a.m. on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, heading for a second-straight weekly gain. Texas electricity demand reached a seasonal record this morning as temperatures in Dallas dropped to 17 degrees. Demand climbed to 55,856 megawatts at 8 a.m. local time, topping the record of 52,001 reached yesterday, said Dottie Roark, a spokeswoman at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which operates most of the state’s grid. “Everything is operating normally,” Roark said today in a phone interview. “We shouldn’t have any problems barring unforeseen emergencies.” Cold weather this week has lifted gas demand and is forecast to do so through Jan. 13 along the East Coast, according to EarthSat, based in Rockville, Maryland. Higher temperatures are forecast to start moving through the Midwest and farther east in the second half of next week, the forecaster said. “We are forecasting New York to bottom out at 16 Fahrenheit Sunday morning and Chicago reaching around 8 degrees the same morning,” Travis Hartman, EarthSat’s energy manager, said in a statement today. “By the middle of next week, temperatures could rebound into the 40s to near 50 in some locations of the mid- Atlantic.” The normal low for New York is 26 degrees Fahrenheit and in Chicago the minimum is typically 14, according to the National Weather Service. Once above-normal temperatures arrive, they may stay through Jan. 22, EarthSat said in its eight-to-14-day outlook. U.K. gas demand may jump to a record today, National Grid PLC said, as temperatures in the Scottish Highlands dropped to as low as minus 22 degrees Celsius. Car breakdowns in the U.K. reached record numbers this week as the longest cold snap in 30 years left drivers stranded with powerless car batteries, unresponsive engines and even frozen diesel in some Scots’ fuel tanks. In and around London, thermometers registered minus 3 degrees Celsius early today. Snow flurries were forecast for London and eastern England today with freezing weather predicted nationwide through Jan. 10. The U.K. weather forecaster expects 12 more days of below- average cold for Britain. A new storm headed toward Germany, while northern Spain also braced for heavy snow. Eurostar Group Ltd. canceled a third of today’s services linking London with Paris and Brussels. Snow fell today at Alpine ski resorts including Zermatt in southern Switzerland as well as eastern France. A storm moving from the Mediterranean known as “Daisy” started bringing snow and high winds to parts of Switzerland, France, Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic today as it collided with freezing arctic air, the German Meteorological Service said. Switzerland’s Gotthard tunnel, a main pass to Italy, was closed because of heavy snowfall. The U.K. gas transmission operator yesterday reduced supply to 95 customers that have interruptible contracts. These contracts allow the buyer to buy cheaper gas at other times of the year on the condition that supply can be interrupted at times of peak demand. |
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