The government forecast Tuesday that most households will pay more for heat this winter. Heating oil users will catch a slight break, but will still pay near-record prices to keep warm.
Prices for natural gas, electricity and propane should be higher, the primary reason that more than 90 percent of U.S. homes will incur higher heating expenses.
Natural gas users will see the biggest percentage increase after two years of historically low prices. Their heating bills should rise to an average of $679, the Energy Department said in its annual outlook for heating costs. That is about 13 percent higher than a year ago but still 4 percent below the average for the previous five winters.
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I guess that means Delmarva folks will pay even more due Delmarva power, the rip off company.
ReplyDelete"Heating oil users will catch a slight break, but will still pay near-record prices to keep warm."
ReplyDeleteHow am I getting a slight break when I am paying near-record prices?
Stupidest thing I have read all day.
Penny less? Nickel lees?
Wait until 2015, when electric rates will be 8 times what they are now--do your research--it is coming!
ReplyDeletePJM Interconnection, the company that operates the electric grid for 13 states (Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia) held its 2015 capacity auction. These are the first real, market prices that take Obama’s most recent anti-coal regulations into account, and they prove that he is keeping his 2008 campaign promise to make electricity prices “necessarily skyrocket.”
The market-clearing price for new 2015 capacity – almost all natural gas – was $136 per megawatt. That’s eight times higher than the price for 2012, which was just $16 per megawatt. In the mid-Atlantic area covering New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and DC the new price is $167 per megawatt. For the northern Ohio territory served by FirstEnergy, the price is a shocking $357 per megawatt.
Why the massive price increases? Andy Ott from PJM stated the obvious: “Capacity prices were higher than last year's because of retirements of existing coal-fired generation resulting largely from environmental regulations which go into effect in 2015.” Northern Ohio is suffering from more forced coal-plant retirements than the rest of the region, hence the even higher price.
These are not computer models or projections or estimates. These are the actual prices that electric distributors have agreed to pay for new capacity. The costs will be passed on to consumers at the retail level.