Texas Cools in Five-Day Outlook, Heat Returns Later, Rogers Says c.2011 Bloomberg News

Sept. 6 (Bloomberg) -- The interior U.S. from the Great Lakes to Texas will be cooler through the rest of the week before the heat returns, according to Matt Rogers, president of Commodity Weather Group LLC.

Temperatures across the South are expected to be between 6 to 12 degrees Fahrenheit (3 to 6.6 Celsius) below the 1981-2010 normal range for the region, Rogers said.

The heat returns to the Great Plains and Texas from Sept. 11 to Sept. 15, according to Rogers’s latest 6- to 10-day forecast. It becomes more intense over Texas and spreads into the Rocky Mountains and east to the Great Lakes region from Sept 16 to Sept. 20, according to his 11- to 15-day forecast.

Rogers said a short-lived and weak tropical system may develop in the eastern or southern Gulf of Mexico by the end of the week.

The National Hurricane Center is tracking an area of disturbed weather in the Bay of Campeche that has a 20 percent chance of becoming a tropical system in the next two days.

Natural gas traders use long-range temperature predictions to gauge energy use and market fluctuations. Hot weather or cold weather can increase energy demand for heating and cooling.

--Editors: Dan Stets

To contact the reporter on this story: Brian K. Sullivan in Boston at bsullivan10bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstetsbloomberg.net