The Hope Gas farm tap proposal is causing complaints and concerns from customers

MORGANTOWN – A Hope Gas proposal to convert 629 customers from farm faucets to propane has drawn significant opposition — with 31 letters of protest filed in six days.

Some point out that they, and sometimes the owners before them, have had free gas for decades.

“I’ve owned this property for 40 years and free gas is listed in the deed,” says one.

And again: “My family has had free natural gas on this property for over twenty years. It’s in the deed for our house and property. The families who owned this property before us had free gas for much longer than that! Almost all of our appliances also drop. … Not to mention road maintenance for these heavy duty propane trucks driving these WV gravel back roads.”

And, “I do not support canceling free gas rights made and negotiated that have existed for over a hundred years.”

Others are emotional and talk about the hardships the conversion might pose.

“If I lose my free gas and start paying a heat bill, I’ll have to leave my house and I’ll be homeless really because I won’t be able to pay the rent anywhere else and I don’t really have family to live with ! I’m a widow on a fixed income and can barely afford to buy groceries after paying all my bills the way I am now!”

The Public Service Commission has set an evidentiary hearing for Dec. 9 at its headquarters in Charleston.

Farm tap customers typically live along the lines and have wells drilled on their property and access those lines to receive their gas supply.

Hope Gas proposes to abandon or transfer to other companies certain gathering pipelines it previously acquired from Equitrans and Dominion Gathering and Processing. Hope has bought about 3,000 miles of pipeline, he said, with about 14,800 farm customers.

Hope said some of those lines are no longer needed or useful. Jeffrey S. Nehr, Hope’s senior vice president of gas supply and corporate development, told the PSC that providing safe, reliable and economical service to farm customers along these lines is at risk because existing service “is either unsafe, either unreliable or uneconomical. , or any combination of the three.”

It wants to switch 479 farm-to-faucet customers along those collection system pipelines, along with 150 farm-to-faucet customers served on pipelines owned by Diversified and other companies to propane.

Affected customers live in 22 counties, including Monongalia, Marion, Harrison and Wetzel.

Hope aims to convert these customers to propane at its own expense, at about $10,000 per customer plus $2,000 for propane storage and home lines. Or, if the customer so desires, Hope will convert them to electric service provided by a local electric utility – the switch also at Hope’s expense.

Letters of protest raise various issues. So far, most, but not all, have come from Calhoun County. Here is a sample of the comments.

One says: “Original oil and gas leases that were negotiated for free gas should be honored and maintained by contract. This is the cost of doing business. Unless both the landowner and the gas company agree to a new contract.

This letter discusses various issues associated with propane emissions and leaks and says that propane has less energy per unit volume, which causes reduced fuel efficiency, requiring more burning than natural gas or heating oil.

Another writer has a private lease. “This will devalue my property so much that I will never be able to sell it, not even for the price I paid. This will make me live on the street. I have no one to build me a fireplace to heat my house, no one to hook up my wood stove. When I bought my farm with private well and gas lease, I bought it so it would never be cold again. You are trying to deny me this and force me to uproot my life and my farm.”

Another says: “This would affect large numbers of elderly and otherwise disadvantaged people who are likely on a fixed income and already struggling to make ends meet. This economy has already put such a strain on most families in this country, let’s not add to that problem.”

One person wrote: “I personally paid for the infrastructure to provide my home with this public utility and I am begging and pleading that PSC and other entities do not allow Hope Gas, Inc. from their responsibility and services to provide me or others. with farm taps, locally sourced from the Appalachian region we live in.”

Several letters question whether Hope will cover the cost of propane for life, or cover it for a limited time, or not at all.

Hope covers some of this in his original filing:

“I hope authorized representatives will meet with customers to explain the process, impact and benefits. The customer will not see any change in costs or services from Hope. They will continue to benefit from gas services under the Hope tariff at rates. Hope will also train customers on propane safety and the operation of new appliances.”

Hope said it will contract with licensed service providers for propane service, propane storage tank and piping installation, appliance conversion and installation of appliance conversions.

“Hope proposes that farm customers converted to propane service shall nevertheless remain Hope customers under the applicable rate schedule in the Company’s rate…the cost of continuing to supply propane to such customers shall be recovered by Hope as a gas supply cost in the PGA ( Application rate of purchased gas). Doing so prevents farm customer churn and is consistent with Hope’s goal of serving customers, acquiring customers and not churning customers. Customers converted to propane will be served at the same rates as before the conversion. In other words, Hope is not proposing to implement a separate rate for customers using propane.”