Sonoma County residents are struggling to cope with skyrocketing winter energy bills

$565.

$759.

And even $940.

These aren’t the usual figures associated with basic monthly gas and electric costs, but they’re numbers I regularly heard in talking to dozens of Sonoma County residents about their recent eye-popping energy bills -- sometimes hundreds of dollars or multiple times more than they’re used to paying.

“As I write you, I sit in my house freezing because I don't want to run up my PG&E bill,” Nixon Maloney said to me in an email this week. “It was 32 degrees last night. I know I'm not the only person living like me.”

Maloney’s bill steadily rose from $175 in November to $357 in December to $719 in January.

Bills have skyrocketed across the West driven by colder-than-normal winter weather and increased natural gas costs. It’s a twofold blow to customers, who, on top of paying more for gas service, are facing higher electricity prices since many power plants use natural gas to generate electricity.

According to Pacific Gas & Electric, average residential bills from November through March will be up 32% compared to the same period last year, though many have seen much steeper spikes.

The problem extends beyond the Northern California utility with Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric customers feeling a similar or even tighter squeeze.

It’s yet another setback for California communities that already weathered higher utility bills, record inflation and routinely have the country’s most expensive gas prices.

Khirsten Stavola’s bill shot up from about $200 per month to $350 “and climbing,” she told me.

“This is really just insane at this point. People can only move their budgets around so much to accommodate the rising energy costs,” said Stavola, who lives in a 1,000-square-foot home with her husband and young child.

The couple sets the thermostat to 63 at night and turns it, and all the lights, off during the day.

“On top of everything else being so expensive right now, this is really a big stressor,” said Stavola, who added that energy costs and how to cope are frequent topics in her local parent groups on Facebook. “It seems unfair that we just have to accept the fate of struggling to pay these cost increases while PG&E sees higher profits, and our government does nothing to help.”

On Jan. 7, the California Public Utilities Commission held a special hearing on the recent high natural gas prices.

“We saw these shockingly high prices that were well beyond our pessimistic expectations for January,” said Mark Pocta of the Public Advocates Office, which represents utility customer interests before the CPUC.

PG&E emphasized that it does not profit off spiking natural gas costs.

“PG&E does not control the market prices for gas and electricity, and like other utilities, PG&E does not mark up the cost of the gas and electricity that we purchase on behalf of our customers,” PG&E spokesperson Meghan McFarland said.

Between Jan. 19-25, California’s average natural gas prices were five times the national benchmark prices, according to the US Energy Information Administration.

California imports roughly 90% of its natural gas from other states.

This winter, interstate pipeline constraints, including problems with a major Texas gas pipeline, converged with lower-than-normal west coast gas storage inventories. At the same time, a prolonged drought has reduced the state’s hydroelectric output and required a heavier reliance on gas generation. Add a cold early winter, and the result is higher demand met with limited supply and utility flexibility--in other words, the formula for sky-high prices.

On Jan. 6, Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote to the Federal Regulatory Commission to investigate “whether market manipulation, anti-competitive behavior, or other anomalous activities are driving these ongoing elevated prices in the western gas markets.”

At the utilities commission hearing, Michael Williamson, a natural gas trader for Williamson Energy, stressed utilities’ need to increase gas storage that can help balance demand and prices amid weather and other disruptions.

Storage in the Pacific region was 34% below the five-year average and 29% below last year, he said, in part due to an accounting measure by PG&E in 2021 to reclassify some of the gas it can use from storage without restocking lost inventory.

PG&E doesn’t “make money on natural gas, and they don’t make the market,” Williamson said. But “they don’t lose money on the natural gas either.”

While the market is now returning to normal, he urged, “if we don’t do something now, then this same thing will happen again and again.”

In a statement, PG&E said its “gas storage reserves purchased for its residential and small commercial customers are at normal midwinter levels...The gas reclassified in 2021 remains in storage and is available to support reliable operations. The change in how the company classifies stored gas has enabled it to maintain service amid challenging times.”

Some help, but not enough

Late last week, the public utilities commission approved immediately sending the state’s utility customers a California Climate Credit that was originally scheduled for April. For PG&E gas and electric customers that means up to $91 off their bill.

But for those with sustained bills in the multiple hundreds of dollars, the one-time discount “sure doesn’t feel like relief,” one woman told me.

For the utility’s part, “PG&E recognizes our responsibility to serve our customers safely and reliably while keeping bills as low as possible,” McFarland said.

"We’re here to help all our customers save money by working with them to find the best rate plan for their household or business, sharing no- and low-cost actions to help them reduce energy usage and better manage monthly bills, and offering assistance programs for income-eligible customers.”

Some of the resources include personalized rate plan comparisons, bill forecast alerts and “budget billing,” which spreads out annual energy costs across the year to avoid surprise bills.

For those that qualify for financial assistance, various programs can provide upwards of 20% discounts, no-charge energy-savings improvements and solar incentives, and the federally funded Low-income Energy Assistance Program offers utility bill payment, emergency assistance and home weatherization.

Moreover, customers with unpaid PG&E bills during the height of the pandemic who got credits previously through the California Arrearage Payment Program should have received a one-time discount early this month.

For those worried about facing shut-offs, McFarland said “we work so hard to not do that,” adding that PG&E will work with customers to create personalized payment plans.

But, as “In Your Corner” readers told me, navigating all of these programs, keeping track of rates that change by time or season, constantly adjusting use and trying to communicate with PG&E can feel like an impossible task and an unfair ask for the simple expectation of affordable heat and light.

Sometimes, it seems the programs don’t deliver.

David Stohlmann enrolled in budget billing and for a few years and was happy with the regular charges he received each month, he said. Now, though, without much change in energy usage, he told me, his “balanced” monthly payments have gone from $176 to $321 in a year.

“It worked so well for so long. How can it be that different for me now?”

Trying to get answers has felt like “talking to a wall,” he said.

Ultimately, while these offerings can provide relief, especially to the financially and medically vulnerable, many who are eligible are already taking advantage. Others don’t make the cut.

Kathleen and Chuck Needels, who make about $40,000 a year through Social Security and a small pension, don’t qualify for PG&E’s low-income customer CARE program that requires a total gross income of $36,620 or less for a household of two.

And, to many, the help available doesn’t feel like a long-term solution to an issue that has increasingly alarmed customers over the years. Indeed, this month last year, I wrote columns on spiking utility costs and utilities commission hearings promising to rein them in.

Bills have only climbed since.

“Giving people the option to go on a payment plan or spread the bill over the year IS NOT THE POINT,” one woman wrote me.

To stabilize bills in the future, PG&E said it’s implementing various strategies to offset gas price spikes. It’s also pursuing federal funding to cover some of its climate resiliency upgrades, and the sale of its San Francisco general office and a licensing agreement with wireless providers should generate $1.3 billion the company said will be used to reduce customer costs.

At the same time, though, the public utilities commission is considering PG&E’s proposed customer rate increases for 2023 through 2026. If approved, which would happen in the fall, that could result in an average 16.3% or $35.40 bump to monthly gas and electric bills this year and a cumulative 25% increase by 2026.

Meanwhile, Sonoma County residents are doing all they can to weather the storm.

One 75-year-old Sebastopol resident and recent widow, described to me how she almost fainted when she saw her recent bill for $930, which already included a low-income discount. It stood in stark contrast to her usual winter energy costs that have ranged in the $300-$500 range.

Now, “I turn the heat to 52 at 7 pm and keep it at about 64 in the day. I am constantly freezing and achy,” she said.

“I seriously feel like I might need to move out of state to a place where I can afford to be warm.”

“In Your Corner” is a column that puts watchdog reporting to work for the community. If you have a concern, a tip, or a hunch, you can reach “In Your Corner” Columnist Marisa Endicott at 707-521-5470 or marisa.endicott@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @InYourCornerTPD and Facebook @InYourCornerTPD.