DOE says natural gas supplies rose last week

The Associated Press is reporting that natural gas in storage in the U.S. rose last week but is 0.5 percent below the five-year average for this time of year, a government report said.

The Energy Department''s Energy Information Administration said in its weekly report that natural-gas inventories held in underground storage in the lower 48 states rose by 87 billion cubic feet to 1.7 trillion cubic feet for the week ending May 23.

The inventory level was slightly below the five-year average of about 1.71 trillion cubic feet, and well below last year''s storage level of 2.02 trillion cubic feet, according to the government data.