The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) projected Hurricane Erin, which was in the Atlantic Ocean between Florida and Bermuda, would move northeast off the US East Coast for the rest of the week without hitting land. The storm, however, could cause some tropical storm force winds in eastern North Carolina and Virginia over the next 24 hours. The NHC said two other systems in the Atlantic Ocean – one with a 60 per cent chance and one with a 40 per cent chance – could strengthen into cyclones over the next week.
Both systems, however, were expected to remain far from the US mainland, at least for the next week or so. Even though storms can boost gas prices by knocking Gulf of Mexico gas production out of service, analysts have said storms are more likely to cut demand and prices by shutting LNG export plants and knocking power out to millions of homes and businesses, reducing the amount of gas that electric generators need to burn. Only about two per cent of all US gas comes from the federal offshore Gulf of Mexico, while more than 40 per cent of the electricity produced in the US comes from gas-fired power plants.
(Reporting by Scott DiSavino in New York Editing by Tomasz Janowski)