By Tom Johnson, NJ Spotlight
The cost of heating a house with natural gas is rising sharply this winter, ranging from $21 a month to as much as $31 per month, depending on which of the state’s four gas utilities supply the fuel.
In unanimously approving the provisional increases that are effective next month, New Jersey Board of Public Utilities commissioners blamed global geopolitical events for the spike without mentioning the obvious — the Russian invasion of the Ukraine and its cutoff of most gas supplies to western Europe.
Higher commodity prices also factored into why customers will pay more, as did increases in transmission costs on interstate pipelines. The four utilities do not make a profit on purchasing gas, only on delivering it to customers through their local distribution systems.
Timing is everything
Nevertheless, the higher bills come at a time when consumers are paying more for food, gasoline, and other energy bills
“These steep increases are really going to hurt,’’ said Eveyn Liebman, an associate director of AARP in New Jersey, citing higher inflation and higher cost of living in the state. “This is only going to make life worse for people already facing hard times.’’
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