New York Staff: Without Interim Supply Cost Adjustments, Utilities Would Have Under-collected $330 Million During Year, Or 15% Of Statewide Supply Cost

In a report on the yearly reconciliation of default service gas supply costs, Staff of the New York Department of Public Service reported that, without interim adjustments to the supply rates during the year, the state's natural gas utilities would have collectively under-collected by approximately $332 million, or approximately 15% of the statewide gas cost

In the reconciliation report, Staff stated, "To ensure that the year-end imbalances are kept to a minimum, the major gas LDCs closely monitor their gas costs and recoveries, as well as regularly inform Staff of the year-end imbalance projections. Due to the potential significant gas cost imbalances caused by the volatile weather and a few cold spells, all major gas LDCs, except National Fuel Gas Distribution Corporation, filed interim gas cost adjustments. Rochester Gas and Electric Corporation was the only company that implemented a refund by passing back to customers $1.0 million while the other nine major gas LDCs surcharged customers approximately $256 million through interim gas cost adjustments. Absent these interim gas cost adjustments, the LDCs collectively would have under collected by approximately $332 million, or approximately 15% of the statewide gas cost, which would have resulted in detrimental effects to customers’ calendar year 2019 bills. However, due to the implementation of these interim gas cost adjustments, customers served by these large gas LDCs will not experience significant calendar year 2019 bill increases as a result of this year’s gas cost reconciliation."

Staff also summarized the final reconciliation surcharges or refunds to be applied by the utilities during 2019 to reflect the annual gas cost reconciliations. Such amounts were first reported by EnergyChoiceMatters.com (and updated to reflect any LDC-filed corrections), see our prior stories below:

ConEd, O&R, NFGD, Central Hudson (Note: NYSEG and RGE amounts listed in story were later updated)

NYSEG, RGE (Updated)

NiMo, KEDNY, KEDLI