EIA releases report on natural gas delivery trends
The U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) issued a new report on natural gas delivery companies.
The EIA’s Natural Gas Annual Respondent Query System report said 2,022 natural gas delivery companies delivered natural gas to end-use customers in the United States in 2018.
Local distribution companies (LDCs) delivered approximately 90 percent, or 22 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d), of end-use natural gas to the residential and commercial sectors. Municipal utilities, or natural gas distribution companies owned by a municipality, average just 3 MMcf/d of deliveries in 2018. They accounted for 5 percent and 6 percent of residential and commercial deliveries, respectively, in the United States.
There are 553 pipeline companies in the United States, which are companies that deliver to electric power and industrial customers. They accounted for almost 75 percent of natural gas delivered to electric power sector customers and more than 50 percent of the natural gas delivered to industrial sector customers in 2018. Pipeline companies delivered an average of 65 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) directly to end users.
Natural gas deliveries are categorized as either transported volumes, where the company provides only delivery of the natural gas on behalf of the consumer, or sales volumes, where the delivery company takes ownership of the natural gas and then sells it to the final end user. Transported volumes, which are mostly delivered by pipeline companies, accounted for 86 percent of industrial deliveries and 94 percent of electric power sector deliveries in 2018.
As for sales volumes, volumes of natural gas consumed in the residential sector are mostly sales volumes, accounting for 86 percent of total deliveries in that sector.
