Breaking new ground in Florida’s gas industry, City Gas Co., anNUI Corp. utility subsidiary, announced last week that a newlypassed tariff has enabled third-party suppliers in its serviceterritory to sign commercial and industrial customers withoutrestriction. The new program, called the Commercial TransportationService, is the first choice program without limitations in thestate, City Gas said. The plan was approved in late November by theFlorida Public Service Commission (PSC).

Chris Reardon, a spokesman for City Gas, said under the oldtransportation tariff, the utility required third-party suppliersto bring new customer usage onto its system to match anytransportation usage of existing customers, a requirement both theutility and third-party suppliers found to be a roadblock. “Thetariff discouraged suppliers from signing customers because theywere worried that they would have to match the new load. With thenew tariff, suppliers can go sign up customers without thatrestriction, or any restriction for that matter.”

The utility serves close to 10,000 commercial and industrialcustomers. Fifteen marketers operate in the service territory.Under the new plan, these customers can also purchase additionalservices, such as interstate transportation and storage, separatelyas needed.

“Our non-residential customers in Florida now have greaterchoice in fulfilling their energy needs,” said Ray DeMoine, NUI’sdirector of rates and compliance. “Not only can they now choosetheir gas supplier, they can purchase a variety of unbundledservices specifically tailored to their energy requirements. Inaddition, as City Gas is the first utility to offer these serviceoptions, our program can be used as a model for other utilities inthe state.”

While Reardon said the company was excited about this new step,he also was careful to say that this is not the harbinger ofstatewide gas choice. “City Gas Co. and NUI are both ardentsupporters of deregulation. Gas choice across the board is a goodthing. However, we realize that each state needs to go at its ownspeed. Realizing that, we defer to the PSC to set the pace.” Thestate commission could not be reached before press time.

City Gas Co., headquartered in Hialeah, FL serves more than100,000 customers in Florida. NUI Corp., based in Bedminster, NJ,operates natural gas utilities serving more than 370,000 customersin six states along the eastern seaboard and operates anon-regulated third party supplier, NUI Energy.

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