Natural gas rates for Squamish customers won’t be adversely impacted by Woodfibre LNG.
FortisBC would like to correct statements made by Eoin Finn, of My Sea to Sky, in his letter to the editor, “Higher gas rates to come?,” which ran on Oct. 6.
In his letter, Mr. Finn states that homeowners who use natural gas in Squamish and the Sea to Sky region will pay more once our proposed Eagle Mountain-Woodfibre Gas Pipeline (EGP) Project is complete. This is not the case.
To be clear, no FortisBC residential or commercial customers will contribute towards the cost of the EGP Project.
In December 2014, the provincial government set out an Order in Council establishing a natural gas transportation rate called Rate Schedule 50 for delivery of natural gas to large industrial customers such as Woodfibre LNG.
Rate Schedule 50 is designed to make sure that these industrial customers bear the costs of building new natural gas infrastructure to meet their requirements, as well as contribute towards their use of existing natural gas infrastructure. FortisBC residential and commercial customers will not pay for the EGP Project, and will benefit by having more users, like Woodfibre LNG, share the costs of the existing system.
Natural gas prices in British Columbia continue to remain near their lowest levels of the last decade.
Mr. Finn’s claim that your natural gas bill is going up by 80 per cent is incorrect. What is increasing is just one part of your monthly bill, the cost of gas. FortisBC purchases natural gas on the open market and does not mark up the cost of gas, so customers pay what we pay. You can learn more about your natural gas bill on our website.
If you still have questions about how the rates for the Woodfibre LNG project were set, please come visit me at our community office, located at 38134 Cleveland Ave., or phone our toll-free line at 1-855-380-5784.
Elliot Moses
Community relations manager,
FortisBC
