National Grid is predicting that the cost of heating bills in upstate New York will decrease by 10 percent this winter.

The average household will pay $65 less in heating bills than last winter, meaning it will only cost an average of $554 this year to pay for heat from November through March, according to National Grid. This is a decrease from last winter’s average heating bill of $619. The expected lower heating bill is in part due to decreasing costs of electricity and gas in the nation.

Virginia Limmiatis, a National Grid media relations representative, said the cost of electricity and gas has gone down because last year’s cold temperatures caused usage to go up. Since all units were competing for the same source of energy for heating, that made prices go up.

“The electricity generators used natural gas and competing for the same natural resources is what made prices higher,” she said. “They had to use coal and oil as an alternative mean to generate electricity.”

Melanie Littlejohn, the regional executive director of National Grid, said in a Sept. 30 Syracuse.com article that the forecast of lower bills assumes normal weather and extreme cold weather could change the outlook.

Mariana Espinal, a senior mechanical engineering major, said last year she was really upset with National Grid after receiving an extremely high bill during the winter.

“Normally the bill ranged from about $65 to $200 per month. We had one month, I think February, that came out to about $400,” she said. “It was insane, our usage hadn’t changed, they just doubled the cost of everything for the month.”

Espinal said she wasn’t the only customer dealing with the rise in prices last winter. Most of the people living in the neighborhood around Syracuse University had to deal with the high prices because National Grid is basically the only gas and electric company in the area, she said.

Espinal said the news about decreasing prices is encouraging but only if the cost difference is significant.

“If I start saving $20 to $40 each month on my bill, I’d probably be a happy National Grid customer,” she said.

“We had to just suck it up and pay $400 that month,” she said. “I was really angry but you know, you can’t really live without heat or electricity in the winter.”

Gisselle Cedeno, a junior communications and rhetorical studies major, is also looking forward to saving money.

“It would help a lot if my heating bill wasn’t as bad as everyone is saying it was last year,” Cedeno said. “I have other things I need to pay for so saving every little bit helps.”

Published on October 7, 2014 at 12:01 am

Contact Lauren: lmdoyle@syr.edu