Member Profiles: Citizens Gas Utility District

Citizens Gas Utility District in northeastern Tennessee started from humble beginnings in 1958 with a small customer base and only three full time employees. Since then, it has grown to a system of 42 employees serving natural gas to over 9800 customers (and propane to 700 customers) in the two county service area of Scott and Morgan Counties.

Supervising the daily operations of Citizens Gas Utility District is General Manager Freddy Bishop, who served as General Manager of the District from October 1983 until June of 2006 when he was promoted to the title of CEO. He began his career with Citizens Gas Utility District in June of 1979, working as the Office Manager, Construction Superintendent, and as Assistant Manager.

In June of 2006, David Lloyd, who had been with Citizens Gas Utility for 17 years serving as Accounting Manager and Assistant General Manger, was promoted to General Manager of the Citizens Gas Utility District Distribution System.

Over Freddy and David is a five-member elected Board of Commissioners who govern the Citizens Gas Utility District. Each commissioner is elected by the consumer owners for a five-year term. Three commissioners must reside in Scott County, and the remaining two must live in Morgan County.

Freddy Bishop

Currently, the Scott County commissioners are Paul Bilbrey, Hubert Duncan, and Norton Tate. The present Morgan County commissioners are Charles Kennedy and Clyde Walker. The commissioners oversee the management finances of the utility, set priorities, and generally act as the policy making body of Citizens Gas Utility District.

Citizens Gas' 741 mile network of 6" and 8" steel mains operate from 200 psi to 1,000 psi. Because of the different pressures, they have a series of 12 compressor stations on the gas mains monitored 24/7.

Citizens Gas has an unusually large number of supply options, getting its natural gas supply from the East Tennessee Gas Pipeline, Delta Natural Gas, Inc., and Columbia Natural Resources. In addition, there is local gas well production in the surrounding counties in Tennessee and nearby Kentucky. To use this gas from local wells, the system uses a series of filters, oil separators, and dehydration units to clean up the gas.

Citizens Gas Utility District holds an additional ace for dealing with high gas prices: the Indian Creek Storage field in Morgan County, which is filled during the spring and early summer months in preparation for the winter peak season. If the price in the fall and winter increases above the average cost of their natural gas storage, then they pull for their customers needs from this storage field, which is capable of holding up to 2,200,000 DKT of natural gas and can deliver gas at a daily rate up to 20,000 DKT per day. If the price of natural gas in the fall and winter heating season is less than the average price of gas in storage, then they usually use the lower priced index gas to supply our customers.

If the winter price is considerably lower than the average cost of gas in storage, “we might even inject gas intro the storage during the winter months to lower our average cost of stored gas,’ says Freddy Bishop.” For example, in January 2001, the index price of gas was about $9.60 per mmbtu and we withdrew from storage. However, in January 2002, the index price of gas was about $2.56 per mmbtu, so we supplied our customers with the index price gas, as well as injected into storage, to lower our average cost of gas.”

Citizens Gas Utility District is a member of APGA because we believe that the large oil and gas producers are able to unduly influence the price of natural gas in this country. APGA, through the gas utilities they represent, is a voice for the residential and small commercial consumers of natural gas who have no other choice but to pay the high fuel prices which continue to increase the profits of the large oil and gas companies.

APGA’s efforts to open doors to drilling for natural gas in areas that are currently restricted in order to increase the natural gas supply, and to continue to work toward improving, correcting, and monitoring the methods that are currently being used to buy and sell gas in an effort to protect the general public from natural gas price manipulation by the traders and large oil and gas producers.

“In addition to the price of natural gas, APGA should focus on “Natural Gas Safety” and the promotion of natural gas as an excellent fuel choice for the residential and small commercial customers to use in homes and business.”

Originally in January 7, 2007 Public Gas News