Natural gas prices go up 53% in Pinedale
Gas, gas everywhere....but...
by Bob Rule, KPIN 101.1 FM, Pinedale
November 22, 2005
(Pinedale) You don’t have to look very far to find a natural gas drilling rig or an operating natural gas well as you travel just outside Pinedale, but the abundance of natural gas surrounding Pinedale apparently isn’t having any effect on the price that consumers will be paying for natural gas to heat their homes this winter.
Effective October 13, 2005, customers of Pinedale Natural Gas, Inc., will be seeing a 53% increase in their cost for natural gas. This will raise the monthly natural gas bill of the average Pinedale area customer by $57.60 per month, according to an announcement from the Wyoming Public Service Commission in Cheyenne. The announcement states that this is the result of a “pass on” rate increase, which means that Pinedale Natural Gas is simply “passing on” to their customers the increased wholesale cost of natural gas that the gas company is having to pay for its gas. As a result, the normal PSC procedures of holding a public rate hearing, prior to the price increase, do not apply in this case.
The announcement from the PSC, issued on November 17, 2005, does not address the question of who is “passing on” this rate increase to Pinedale Natural Gas or why the 53% increase in wholesale price is necessary.
Although permission has already been granted by the PSC to Pinedale Natural Gas for the rate increase, the PSC is nevertheless extending an opportunity for any interested person or group to file a statement, comment, protest, or request for a public hearing regarding the rate increase. They must be made in writing to the Wyoming Public Service Commission, 2515 Warren Avenue, Suite 300, Cheyenne, Wyoming, 82002 prior to December 5, 2005, and must mention docket number 30016-38-GP-05.
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