The cold season for 2021-22 offered a lot of variety most of which was not friendly to the natural gas market. The cold season started with a very warm climate feature record warmth in December. However, the mid-winter when temperatures are coldest observed a reversal in the pattern featuring top-third cold in the high energy demand northeast quadrant of the U.S. February brought a “polar vortex” cold outbreak surging into Texas and pulsing across the East followed by another cold shot in early March.

Next week (Mar. 6-10) features a La Nina-style rainstorm across the Mid-South U.S. according to ECMWF. The event is reminiscent of a wetter La Nina climatology for the East-central/Mid-south U.S. largely due to the warmer oceans of the middle latitudes occurring with modern-day La Nina episodes.

An unusually hostile climate pattern has emerged in South America during the 2021-22 warm season. Anomalous heat and dryness have propelled a drought in Paraguay to Southeast Brazil to Northern Argentina while excessive rains have plagued Brazil. While La Nina has contributed to this pattern, the more likely specific catalyst is the semi-permanent upper-level low-pressure trough southeast of Brazil extending northwestward into Brazil to cause convective rains compensated for by subsidence on the back side of that rainfall and centered on Paraguay and Argentina to cause just-the-opposite climate pattern – dryness and heat to accelerate drought.