Understanding and Managing Your Commercial Gas Bill
Bringing "Virtual Pipeline" to the Southeast
For most commercial and industrial customers, natural gas is seen as a fixed operating cost. The bills arrive each month and get paid without much scrutiny. But taking a closer look at your bill can reveal powerful insights into how you're using energy and where you can reduce business energy costs.
Let’s take a closer look at how to read your bill and go about an internal review that helps you reduce energy consumption in commercial buildings, so you can lower your monthly costs.
How to Read Your Commercial Natural Gas Bill
For effective commercial gas management, it helps to understand how each line item relates to your energy use, so you can reduce business energy costs.
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Previous Balance, Payment and Balance Forward
These itemized lines show what you owed last month, what you paid and whether any amount is being carried forward. A zero balance forward means you’re starting fresh with the next billing cycle. -
Interstate Pipeline Charges (DDDC)
This reflects your share of interstate pipeline capacity, billed as “DDDC” (Designated Design Day Capacity). It’s the cost of ensuring gas can be delivered to your facility on the coldest day of the year. Managing peak usage can help keep this charge from increasing over time. -
Gas Charges
This is the cost of the natural gas you actually used. Tracking this number month to month helps you spot unusual spikes that might signal equipment issues or operational inefficiencies—an important step in reducing your commercial natural gas bill. -
Customer Service Fee
This is a fixed monthly fee that covers account administration. The amount doesn’t change with usage. -
Atlanta Gas Light’s Base Charge
For Georgia customers, this fee is collected on behalf of your utility company, Atlanta Gas Light. This is the utility’s charge for maintaining natural gas pipelines, meters and infrastructure. -
Taxes and Regulatory Fees
These vary by region and are generally non-negotiable, but understanding them helps you isolate the parts of your bill you can control. -
Total New Charges, Total Amount Due
This is your full cost for the billing period, and it’s the main number you have power over by managing usage, reducing peaks and identifying inefficiencies.
Conduct a natural gas audit to help manage your costs.
A commercial natural gas audit—or industrial natural gas audit for larger facilities—is one of the most effective ways to uncover savings. You don’t need a consultant to get started; an internal review can reveal patterns and inefficiencies that directly impact your bill.
Steps to Starting a Commercial Natural Gas Audit
Gather your usage data.
With at least 12 months of natural gas bills, look for seasonal patterns, peak usage months, unexpected spikes and any correlation with your production cycles.
Identify your major natural gas equipment.
These commonly include items such as boilers, water heaters, furnaces, industrial process equipment, and items used in commercial kitchens and laundry systems.
Evaluate your operating schedules.
Are your systems running when the building is empty? Do you have equipment that’s oversized or using more energy than necessary? Are systems cycling on too frequently? Are your production widows lining up with optimal use times?
Once you’ve got all this information, here are aspects to consider:
Look for inefficiencies.
Poor insulation, leaking steam lines, cruddy valves, blocked vents, inefficient burners and heat loss through vents are all issues that can go unnoticed but can add up on your energy bill. A routine inspection schedule can help you catch these inefficiencies before they drive up consumption, ensuring your system performs reliably throughout the year.
Consider demand patterns.
Demand charges and delivery fees are determined by how much gas you use at one time. If you’ve got several pieces of equipment firing up at the same time, your peak demand rises, and that sets certain charges on your bill.
To cut down on demand, try staggering equipment start-ups, pre-heat during off-peak hours, use programmable controls and see where you can tighten production schedules. Over time, smoothing out how and when your equipment starts up can help even out or lower your DDDC.
Compare your gas plan to your usage.
All too often, businesses are on a plan that doesn’t match up with their consumption patterns. But providers like Gas South offer creative pricing strategies and expert energy guidance that can help you bring plan type and usage into alignment.
Tips to Lower Your Commercial Natural Gas Bill
Once you know where you stand on energy use, expenses and plan types, you can start making practical moves to reduce business energy costs and lower your natural gas bill:
Optimize building controls.
Making use of smart thermostats and occupancy sensors, as well as putting night-setback temperatures into play, will reduce unnecessary heating.
Make building improvements.
Sealing leaks, adding more insulation and upgrading doors and windows will help reduce energy consumption in commercial buildings.
Upgrade your equipment.
Modern boilers and heaters can reduce fuel use by 10 – 30%, compared to older models. In many cases, the upgrade pays for itself in just a few short years—this can also help you meet sustainability goals.
Keep up with maintenance.
Routine maintenance keeps everything running as efficiently as possible, which saves on energy use while preserving the life of your equipment. So, whether it’s cleaning burners and combustion surfaces, checking for leaks, calibrating controls and sensors or looking for cracks, corrosion and signs of wear, a little attention goes a long way.
Keep track of your usage monthly.
Monthly tracking helps you catch issues early and maintain control over managing natural gas usage for business. And it also gives you insight into more long-term usage trends, helping you plan more confidently.
Use market intelligence.
Don’t ignore market reports, NYMEX updates and provider analytics to make informed purchasing decisions. At Gas South, we take pride in the fact that we offer timely market insights, custom reports for your business and NYMEX data to keep you abreast of an ever-changing market.
Understanding what drives your natural gas costs is essential when choosing a natural gas company. Through regular audits, smarter scheduling and a plan aligned with your usage, you can reduce waste, improve efficiency and make your energy budget work harder for your business.
Get monthly market insights to help your energy management.
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