‘Yankee Gas Requests $209 Million Rate Hike’ | CT News Junkie

As published by the CT News Junkie:

Yankee Gas is asking state regulators for a $209 million rate hike, which would mean a monthly increase of more than $46 for residential heating customers.

Yankee Gas’s application was filed Tuesday with the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA), and if approved would become effective in November 2025. PURA told Yankee Gas that if it did not file its own application by December, it would initiate its own review. Yankee Gas is a subsidiary of Eversource.

The application includes a proposed supply-related credit, which would reduce that increase from 42% to 38% depending on a customer’s seasonal usage, according to company officials.

Yankee Gas has not filed a rate request in six years, said Sarah Paduano, an Eversource spokesperson.

“The increase is driven by the substantial investments we’ve made – and must continue to make – in the natural gas distribution system to ensure customers have safe, reliable service year-round, and especially during the winter heating months,” Paduano said. “These vital investments are part of the service customers pay for through rates and are critical to safety and reliability.”

Yankee Gas has included a multi-year performance-based regulatory plan that will tie customer rates to its performance and that representatives said will also promote long-term cost control, bill stability and emissions reduction.

The company – which serves around 252,300 customers in 85 cities and towns – also anticipates adding 2,500 new heating customers over the period from Nov. 1, 2025 through Oct. 31, 2026, according to the application.

While there have been repair and replacements projects done since the 2018 rate case, Yankee Gas is also planning various capital projects amounting to $311.1 million.

The company has a Flood Hardening Program – which is a 14-year capital improvement plan that started in 2019. Storms such as Hurricanes Sandy and Katrina showed that the gas industry can be vulnerable to flood damage, according to testimony submitted with the application.

Shoreline towns such as Norwalk, Stamford, and New London have older systems, so Yankee Gas has scheduled some initiatives to address this including replacing or upgrading around 80 miles of low pressure pipes, also called “mains,” and retiring, relocating, or hardening 28 regulator stations currently within the 500-year flood zone.  Since the 2018 rate case, the company has retired or relocated six stations.

The application was met with criticism Tuesday.

Republican state Sen. Ryan Fazio, a ranking senator on the Energy and Technology Committee, Sen. Jeff Gordon, and Senate Minority Leader Stephen Harding issued a statement: 

“We urge PURA to evaluate this filing in a probing fashion and defend consumers with all legal authority at their disposal. Family budgets in Connecticut are already badly strained,” the statement reads.

Attorney General William Tong said this rate case is a bill Connecticut residents can’t afford.

“You don’t have to be a lawyer to see some basic obvious overreach in this filing. They’re asking for profits that are completely out of whack with other public utilities, including tacking on a non-starter ‘regulatory risk premium’ to account for the fact that our public utilities don’t like oversight and accountability,” Tong said.

The public will get a chance to either submit letters to PURA or voice their concerns at public hearings.