Natural gas posted gains on Monday after the prices of alternative forms of energy increased.

Natural gas for March delivery increased by 24.3 cents, or 3.1 percent, to $7.983 per million British thermal units on the New York Mercantile Exchange after an earlier decline to as low as $7.58 per million Btu.

Coal for delivery at the Big Sandy River, a benchmark for supplies from the Appalachian states, increased to $75.50 a ton in spot market trading on Feb.1, the highest since January 1984.

The snowstorms in China disrupted the world's largest producer and consumer of coal forcing it to halt exports until April.

The increase in crude and heating oil also contributed to the increase of gas, after crude oil for March delivery increased by $1.32, or 1.5 percent, to $90.28 a barrel in New York.

According to the U.S. Energy Department, industrial use accounts to 78 percent of U.S. gas use although there were speculations of a decline in the industrial use of gas due to the weaker U.S. economy.

China Energy