The Missouri Public Service Commission has approved a proposal by Laclede Gas Co. to reorganize its corporate structure to form a holding company known as The Laclede Group, Inc. Laclede’s shareholders approved the change in January. It should be operational by October. “The holding company structure gives us the flexibility to grow our enterprise while maintaining our high level of safe and reliable service to our natural gas customers,” said CEO Douglas H. Yaeger. Under the new holding company structure, Laclede Gas would become a wholly owned subsidiary of The Laclede Group, Inc., but would continue to operate as a regulated natural gas distribution utility. Existing corporate subsidiaries of Laclede Gas — Laclede Energy Resources, Laclede Venture, Laclede Development, Laclede Investment, Laclede Gas Family Services and Laclede Pipeline — would become subsidiaries of The Laclede Group Inc. and would remain unregulated.

The Philadelphia Gas Works (PGW) filed a settlement proposal with the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) that plans to reduce rates to its more than 520,000 residential, commercial and industrial customers by up to $171 million. “Natural gas prices have been dropping after reaching an all-time high last winter,” said Craig White, senior vice president and interim COO, “and we’ve worked overtime to capture as much of these reductions as possible for our customers.” The settlement agreement calls for a two-tiered reduction in customer rates. On Sept. 1, a 16%, or $135 million cut in the Gas Cost Rate (GCR) would result in a $19 per month lowering of the typical residential home heating customer’s bill. Then on Dec. 1 an additional $6 per month reduction amounting to $36 million is anticipated. This would bring the total annual reduction for these customers to 20%.

Avista Corp. affiliate Avista Utilities filed a request with the Oregon Public Utility Commission (OPUC) that would result in no change in natural gas rates for nearly all of Avista’s Oregon gas customers. The filing, known as a Purchase Gas Cost Adjustment (PGA), is normally made once a year to reflect changes in the cost of gas purchased by the company to serve its customers. Avista Utilities does not mark up or make additional profits from PGA filings — any increase in revenues is offset by the cost of gas purchased in the marketplace by Avista on behalf of its customers. If the filing is approved by state regulators, a typical Oregon residential customer using 56 therms of natural gas would continue to pay $55.17 a month. Avista has asked that the filing become effective Oct. 1. “Because of extraordinarily high gas prices last winter, Avista paid substantially more for gas than the price included in customers’ rates during that time,” said Deborah Martin, general manager for Avista Utilities in Oregon. “As a result, we accumulated nearly $10 million in deferred gas costs to serve Oregon customers. Fortunately for our customers, the increase to recover these costs is offset by a decrease to reflect lower projected gas costs over the next year.” According to Martin, Avista’s residential and commercial gas customers would see no change in their rates. Certain large-use industrial customers would see a 2.9% rate decrease.

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