Ohio Natural Gas Utilities

Coming soon we will list all Ohio Natural Gas Suppliers along with all Ohio Natural Gas prices allowing you to sign up for great cheap natural gas pricing.

In 1997 legislation was passed by the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) to allow the unbundling of
services (Deregulation) that allow residential and commercial Natural Gas customers to have a “Choice” of their own supplier. Since 1997 four of the above natural gas utilities listed above were participating in the program.   

Your rate is now dependent on who you receive your natural gas from:

Standard Service Offer (SSO)-  Serves customers not participating in the choice program.  Generally this is the rate delivered by the local Utility.  Rate based on the monthly New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) + Retail Price Adjustment. 

Standard Choice Offer (SCO)-  Serves customers participating in the Choice Program.  Rate based on monthly New York Mecantile Exchange (NYMEX) + Retail Price Adjustment.
 

**The difference between the SSO and SCO lies primarily in the Retail Price Adjustment.

Your natural gas bill is made up of four parts;
1) Gas Commodity Charge: Price and cost of gas based on quantity used obtained from your home meter.
2) Usage Based CDelivery Charge: Based on amount of gas used

3) Customer Charge or Basic Monthly Charge: Fixed monthly charge
4) Sales Tax: SCO customers pay county sales tax on the supply portion of their bill and SSO customers pay an excise tax

Your local utility will still deliver your gas as always for the same fee, but the cost of your natural gas itself is now up to you.

Columbia Gas of Ohio customers will pay less for Natural Gas in the coming year, but it may be tricky for some customers to understand.

First, Columbia will no longer sell gas directly to most customers. Instead, independent suppliers that won Tuesday's company auction will sell directly to consumers instead of to Columbia. But the price will be uniform.

What this means is that customers who have been buying directly from Columbia will now see a supplier's name on their bills, which may be confusing.

They probably will also receive offers from these companies suggesting they sign a fixed-price contract.

The good news is that the five winners of the Columbia auction had to agree to charge the same price -- 15.3 cents over the commodity price of 100 cubic feet of gas set at the end of each month on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

That's almost 20 percent less than the current 18.8 cents that Columbia's suppliers have been adding to the NYMEX price to supply the utility.

The reduction - approved late Tuesday by the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio - begins in April and will be in effect for a year. It means a Northeast Ohio consumer using an average amount of gas will save about $30 a year.

Here's an example. Currently, Columbia's standard service offer is 45.58 cents per 100 cubic feet. The price under Tuesday's auction results would have been 42.08 cents per ccf.

What a consumer pays for gas under this monthly variable rate directly reflects the NYMEX price. And those prices are expected to remain low in the coming year.

One downside to buying gas directly from a supplier is that consumers will now have to pay sales tax that varies by county. Previously, when buying from the utility, consumers paid only a state tax.

Delivery-related charges and a monthly service charge, which are the same no matter who sells you the gas, are extra.