Natural Gas Mains

ScottSecor

@bburd just reminded me of the low gas pressure issues in the street we used to deal with during every cold snap. Hopefully, all of these new high pressure gas mains that were installed in the last seven years can keep up.

 Most if not all of the old gas lines were installed before 1955 in my town and most of the surrounding towns.   More like a twenty or thirty mile radius.  Practically every house,  apartment building,  school, hospital,  etc were heated with oil (#2-#6) until the late 1970's.   Then in the 1980s and 1990's most heating plants switched to oil.  This wreaked havoc on the gas lines that were originally sized for gas ovens, occasionall gas water heater, and clothes dryers.

As of this moment (knock on wood) not one service call for low gas pressure.  In years past we would have five or six right now as it's 11 degrees outside and the winds are howling

EBEBRATT-Ed

We did a gas booster system in a food store so they could operate a gas fired dehumidification (cargocaire) system. They had a 6" main coming in the building, The gas co could only guarantee 4" wc and the unit needed 10". The booster system alone was 28K +install which was another 60K.

It worked when we started it.

Don't know if it shut down the whole town when it started LOL

Steamhead

We're getting a bunch of calls like this, and probably will until the weather warms up next week.

This is the result of the "deregulation" scam, where utility company revenues were redirected to shareholders and CEOs instead of upgrading the network. In Baltimore, BGE is now playing catch-up.

ScottSecor

Don't want to jinx it, but miraculously not one call due to low gas pressure. Fist time since I can remember this happening in my career. Guess I should be thankful the board of public utilities here in NJ upgraded all of those ancient mains.

The Steam Whisperer

Here in Chicago, the good wholesalers still only sell low pressure gas trains on thier big equipment ( 4 inches). While People's Gas have been putting in tons of new high pressure mains here in Chicago, we have seen the installing contractors consistantly undersize the new low pressure gas lines running from the regulators through the exterior wall into the building. It's quite common to see a tiny 1 1/4 gas line run from the meter set and then through the wall to feed a 4inch gas main in the building supplying about 4 million btu's of equipment.

When I have pointed out the undersized line the response has been "its high pressure". When I respond that it is after the regulator........ (black hole empty space).