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I remember the “good ol’ days” when the bill from The Gas Company was like $3 a month. (Oops, maybe I shouldn’t date myself by admitting that.)

I just got our last gas bill (living in LA, we do not use the heater… our gas furnace is not even lit!) and it was a whopping $40.96. We don’t cook (use the oven/stove), save for boiling an occasional pot of water for ramen. We do, however, have a gas washer/dryer… and of course, use hot water to shower. But that’s it, and hot water and clean clothes are necessities in my book.

Now, I don’t know what people in other places (places that are actually cold) pay for gas, but I know what I used to pay for gas as recently as a few months ago.

I’ll cite the amounts of my last year’s worth of gas bills (dates based on the month of the meter reading):

Feb 2006 $40.96
Jan 2006 $39.51
Dec 2005 $22.51
Nov 2005 $18.63
Oct 2005 $16.21
Sep 2005 $13.77
Aug 2005 $12.98
…
Feb 2005 $24.52

The major difference seems to be the baseline rate as my gas usage has only slightly increased since the same time last year. In Feb 2005, the baseline rate per therm was $0.87579; in Feb 2006, it’s $1.17692… a 35% increase in rate since last year! But of course an increase in this rate also increases the public purpose surcharge, as well.

The bottom line is that my gas bill has shot up more than 67% from the same billing cycle from one year ago.

What’s up with that?!