As the year closed, the natural gas market could not find a reason to impose a significant price spike on what had been very low gas acquisition costs (near $3.00 per MMBtu at Henry Hub for much of December.

However, strong supply and relatively mild temperatures in many parts of the nation have cooperated to only impose subtle influences on price movements in the face of the 2011-12 winter heating season. Quantifying that relationship, domestic production in 2011 has risen 7.4 percent year-over-year from 2010, reflecting additional gas produced from shale formations and sold into market.

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