Natural Gas Choice programs in

United States of America The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguo ...

allow residential consumers and other small volume gas users to purchase

natural gas Natural gas (also fossil gas, methane gas, and gas) is a naturally occurring compound of gaseous hydrocarbons, primarily methane (95%), small amounts of higher alkanes, and traces of carbon dioxide and nitrogen, hydrogen sulfide and helium ...

from someone other than their traditional

utility company A public utility company (usually just utility) is an organization that maintains the infrastructure for a public service (often also providing a service using that infrastructure). Public utilities are subject to forms of public control and r ...

. With Natural Gas Choice programs, customers can either purchase from their natural gas utility or choose to receive their gas supply from non-utility suppliers. Large commercial and industrial consumers have had the option of purchasing the natural gas commodity separately from natural gas services for many years.

Natural Gas Choice

Overview

Currently, 21 States and the District of Columbia have legislation or existing programs that allow Natural Gas Choice Programs. Enrollment in “customer choice” programs increased in 2008 for the third year in a row. Overall, more than 13 percent or about 4.7 million of the approximately 35 million residential natural gas consumers with access to choice were buying natural gas from marketers as of December 2008. The availability and characteristics of these customer choice programs vary widely from state to state. Currently the states of

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States Georgia may also refer to: People and fictional characters * Georgia (name), a list of pe ...

and

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

have the highest percentage of customer participation in Natural Gas Choice programs with 81.5 percent and 42.3 percent of customers participating in Natural Gas Choice Programs respectively. New York and

New Jersey New Jersey is a U.S. state, state located in both the Mid-Atlantic States, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States, Northeastern regions of the United States. Located at the geographic hub of the urban area, heavily urbanized Northeas ...

, on the other hand, have customer participation rates of 17.1 percent and 3.1 percent respectively, despite full implementation of Natural Gas Choice Programs.

Georgia

Georgia is the state with the highest participation percentage in Natural Gas Choice programs. In 1999 all Georgia customers became eligible to participate in Natural Gas Choice. At one time 19 natural gas suppliers were approved to supply gas to natural gas customers. However, by 2002, 90% of Georgia residents were served by 3 or fewer marketers.In 2007, Georgia had 1,793,650 residential and 127,835 commercial customers. They consumed approximately 112 and 49 billion cubic feet of natural gas, respectively.

Ohio

Ohio has had Natural Gas Choice since 1997. More than 40 percent of the state's residential natural gas customers were participating in choice programs as of September 2008. Several major Ohio natural gas utilities in Ohio have plans to exit the function of supplying natural gas to customers, leaving the gas supply function to independent natural gas supply companies. In 2007, Ohio had 3,273,791 residential, 272,548 commercial, and 6,865 industrial customers. They consumed approximately 300, 159, and 295 billion cubic feet of natural gas, respectively. Currently, Ohio has 35 natural gas suppliers certified to participate in Natural Gas Choice programs.

References

{{Reflist Energy in the United States Natural gas in the United States