Piedmont Natural Gas Files to Further Reduce Customer Rates in North Carolina and South Carolina

Filings follow on the heels of last month's reduction in billing rates for customers in North Carolina and South Carolina

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Piedmont Natural Gas

Mar 16, 2010, 01:48 ET

CHARLOTTE, N.C., March 16 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Piedmont Natural Gas (NYSE: PNY) today filed to again reduce its customer billing rates for customers in North Carolina and South Carolina. The filings with the North Carolina Utilities Commission (NCUC) and South Carolina's Public Service Commission (PSC) follow on the heels of a similar request last month for lower customer billing rates in the two states. Those requests were approved and placed into effect on March 1. Today's filings seek to further reduce customer billing rates in each state and reflect continuing declines in the wholesale cost of natural gas. The proposed reduction in billing rates for North Carolina customers also reflects a decrease associated with the Company's margin decoupling mechanism in that state.

The proposed reductions, if approved by the respective state regulatory bodies, would each go into effect on April 1, 2010. The proposed reductions would result in reduced residential billing rates ranging from approximately 2 percent (South Carolina) to 4 percent (North Carolina) from their current levels and between 8 percent (South Carolina) and 12 percent (North Carolina) from billing rates of a year ago.

The benchmark reflects the wholesale cost of natural gas supplies purchased by the Company on behalf of its customers and can fluctuate up or down. The wholesale cost of gas represents the single largest portion of a residential or commercial customer's monthly natural gas bill, typically making up between 65 percent and 70 percent of the total bill. As a regulated natural gas distribution company, Piedmont Natural Gas "trues-up" or passes through the wholesale cost of gas to its customers on a dollar-for-dollar basis, without adding on any additional profit margin.

Forward Looking Statement

This press release contains forward-looking statements. These statements are based on management's current expectations and information currently available and are believed to be reasonable and are made in good faith. However, the forward-looking statements are subject to future events, risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in the statements. Factors that may make the actual results differ from anticipated results include, but are not limited to, weather conditions, rate of customer growth, the cost and availability of natural gas, competition from other energy providers, new legislation and regulations and application of existing laws and regulations, economic and capital market conditions, the cost and availability of labor and materials and other uncertainties, all of which are difficult to predict and some of which are beyond our control. For these reasons, you should not rely on these forward-looking statements when making investment decisions. The words "expect," "believe," "project," "anticipate," "intend," "should," "could," "will," "assume," "can," "estimate," "forecast," "future," "indicate," "outlook," "plan," "predict," "seek," "target," "would," and variations of such words and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are only as of the date they are made and we do not undertake any obligation to update publicly any forward-looking statement, either as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. More information about the risks and uncertainties relating to these forward-looking statements may be found in Piedmont's latest Forms 10-K and 10-Q, which are available on the SEC's website at http://www.sec.gov/.

About Piedmont Natural Gas

Piedmont Natural Gas is an energy services company primarily engaged in the distribution of natural gas to more than one million residential, commercial and industrial utility customers in North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee, including 61,000 customers served by municipalities who are wholesale customers. Our subsidiaries are invested in joint venture, energy-related businesses, including unregulated retail natural gas marketing, interstate natural gas storage and intrastate natural gas transportation.

SOURCE Piedmont Natural Gas