يُقيّم الغاز الطبيعي كمصدر طاقة نظيف ويُستخدم على نطاق واسع لتوليد الكهرباء والتدفئة والأغراض الصناعية.
The benchmark U.S. natural gas price is the futures contract based on delivery at Henry Hub, a pipeline junction in Louisiana. The contract trades on the New York Mercantile Exchange, part of CME Group, and is quoted in dollars per million British thermal units (MMBtu). Other regions have their own benchmarks, such as TTF in Europe and JKM in Asia. Because gas depends on pipelines and LNG shipping infrastructure, regional price gaps are much wider than in the oil market.
Natural gas is used heavily for heating and power generation, which makes its price exceptionally sensitive to weather and the seasons. Forecasts of cold winters or hot summers can send prices sharply higher on expected heating or cooling demand. The weekly storage report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration is a central reference: inventories below the five-year average signal tight supply. Storage capacity is limited, so short-term volatility is considerably higher than in crude oil, and single-day swings should be read with that in mind.
The main drivers are temperature forecasts, power-sector demand, U.S. production volumes, and LNG export flows. The growth of LNG export terminals has increasingly linked U.S. prices to supply and demand in Europe and Asia. Unlike oil, gas is not a single global market, so regional inventories and infrastructure conditions need to be checked separately. Crude oil prices, electricity demand data, and the EIA weekly storage report are useful companions when reading the gas market.