EIA: Natural Gas in Storage UP 61 BCF

This is much larger than analysts had speculated, 52 to 56 (Platts) 55 (Thompson Reuters) 58 (Bloomberg) BCF. Front month futures are down 10.3 cents at $2.515.
From the U.S. Energy Information Administration:

Released: May 17, 2012 at 10:30 a.m. (eastern time) for the Week Ending May 11, 2012.
Next Release: May 24, 2012

Working Gas in Underground Storage, Lower 48

other formats:  Summary TXT  CSV

Region	Stocks in billion cubic feet (Bcf)			Historical Comparisons
	05/11/12	05/04/12	Change	Year Ago (05/11/11)		5-Year (2007-2011) Average
				Stocks (Bcf)	% Change	Stocks (Bcf)	% Change
East	1,236	1,189	47	788	56.9	843	46.6
West	386	379	7	248	55.6	288	34.0
Producing	1,045	1,038	7	857	21.9	763	37.0
Total	2,667	2,606	61	1,893	40.9	1,894	40.8

Notes and Definitions Beginning with the report period for the week ending March 16, 2012, EIA is including salt dome and nonsalt-dome subtotals for the Producing Region in the Summary section.   The sum of the components may not equal the total for the Producing Region, because of independent rounding.

Summary Working gas in storage was 2,667 Bcf as of Friday, May 11, 2012, according to EIA estimates. This represents a net increase of 61 Bcf from the previous week. Stocks were 774 Bcf higher than last year at this time and 773 Bcf above the 5-year average of 1,894 Bcf. In the East Region, stocks were 393 Bcf above the 5-year average following net injections of 47 Bcf. Stocks in the Producing Region were 282 Bcf above the 5-year average of 763 Bcf after a net injection of 7 Bcf. Stocks in the West Region were 98 Bcf above the 5-year average after a net addition of 7 Bcf. At 2,667 Bcf, total working gas is above the 5-year historical range. Working gas stocks in the Producing Region, for the week ending May 11, 2012, totaled 1,045 Bcf, with 238 Bcf in salt cavern facilities and 807 Bcf in nonsalt cavern facilities. Working gas stocks decreased 3 Bcf in the salt cavern facilities and increased 10 Bcf in the nonsalt cavern facilities, since May 4. An historical series of the salt and nonsalt subtotals of the Producing Region is available for download at: wngsr_producing_region_salt.xls.

Note: The shaded area indicates the range between the historical minimum and maximum values for the weekly series from 2007 through 2011. Source: Form EIA-912, "Weekly Underground Natural Gas Storage Report." The dashed vertical lines indicate current and year-ago weekly periods.