City of Casey issued the following announcement on Feb. 14.
The extreme record cold temperatures across the entire Midwest and Eastern portion of the country has caused certain interstate natural gas pipelines to limit flows into Illinois. In North Texas and Oklahoma numerous natural gas and oil fields have had to shut down well production to protect equipment that would otherwise be providing natural gas to the pipeline system. The increased usage due to the record cold, coupled with decreased production have caused natural gas prices to skyrocket on the several pipelines. This is causing a direct effect on natural gas prices, as they are increasing to record high rates.
To help reduce our costs and lower our bill to you, we would respectfully request our customers to take every effort to safely reduce their natural gas consumption.
Helpful ideas would be to:
Lower the thermostat in your home (if it is safe to pets, plant and people in your home).
Lower thermostat in your home during unoccupied periods
Do not operate natural gas powered equipment (dryers, gas grills, gas ovens, and garage equipment) if possible.
Run electric space heaters if they can be operated safely.
It appears that temperatures will be warming by Wednesday and pricing should begin to move back towards normal, but it may be advisable to continue keeping your thermostat and gas usage low for the remainder of the month.
Original source can be found here.
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