January crude closed at $60.17 a barrel, up $1.37, to mark its highest closing level since Wednesday, while December natural gas declined 3.1 cents to end at $7.088 per million British thermal units.
Reduced oil flow at Alaska's Trans-Alaska Pipeline helped support oil prices Tuesday. Oil production in Alaska fell below 360,000 barrels per day as of Sunday, from a month high of more than 836,000 bpd a week earlier, due to weather-related disruptions to tanker operations at the port of Valdez last week, state data showed on Tuesday.
The Trans Alaska Pipeline, which connects the oil fields of the North Slope to the Valdez tanker terminal, cut rates to 25 percent of normal Monday amid high stocks at the Valdez tank farm, forcing North Slope oil producers to slash production.
