# New Natural Gas Service Install Cost. Yikes!!!!



## 49er

We have a propane wall furnace and cook stove and will be replacing our wood stove with a gas model this year. Our neighbor has had natural gas service for many years and the gas main is in the street about 300' from our house so I figured what the heck, I might as well look into what it would cost to get hooked up. It couldn't cost that much right? Boy was I ever wrong! I called Pacific Gas & Electric a few days ago to find out what a ballpark price figure might be for them to install a new natural gas service. They just got back to me and said that the total cost would be right around $50,000.00 if you can believe it, I still can't. Needless to say, we will be burning propane here for the rest of our lives.


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## JoeS

That can't be right. Well not at least where I live. I tapped into a NG line 2 years ago. The run was about 175 Ft. My price was just over $1,500.00.


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## KarlP

Either cost of living in California is a LOT more expensive than I think, or someone added an extra zero somewhere.


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## richg

Does the $50,000 get you a week in bed with Christina Hendricks or Scarlett Johannson?


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## fishingpol

It all depends on where the nearest gas service is and if it needs upgrades.  Several years ago the gas co was bringing a new gas service into a local condo complex.  There was a minimum number of residents that first had to sign up with a tie in fee.  Secondly, the condo owner would be responsible for a plumber for inside connections after the meter and gas inspection.  Beautiful thing was they were giving a free gas fired furnace for all new sign ups.  Good bye heat pumps in that place. 

If there is a service line in front of your house, and a relatively short run, costs should be less than a few thousand.  If it is far and say there is rock ledge or some other underground obstacle price goes up.


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## DAKSY

Damn! Even in NY I wouldn't expect to pay THAT much. 
National Grid doesn't even charge for runs up to 100 feet,
IF you hook an appliance to their lines within 90 days...
They're happy to bill you monthly for the warmth/cooking/showers you enjoy...


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## 49er

KarlP said:
			
		

> or someone added an extra zero somewhere.




That's what I was thinking but there was no mistaking what the lady from PG&E told me. She said that they charge $100.00 per foot for new installations and by the time that we added on the cost for permits, surveys, and easements, it could well be right around $50,000.00 and she might not be to far off on those figures. We had been on a septic system here since my parents built the house in the early fifties but about 7 years ago the leach field began to fail so we had to tie into the city sewer system. The permit itself was $8,000.00 and the fee from the civil engineering firm for the survey and legal description for the easement was another $4,00.00.


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## JoeS

I still can't believe that it cost that much. I would have someone come out and give you an estimate!


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## EatenByLimestone

DAKSY said:
			
		

> Damn! Even in NY I wouldn't expect to pay THAT much.
> National Grid doesn't even charge for runs up to 100 feet,
> IF you hook an appliance to their lines within 90 days...
> They're happy to bill you monthly for the warmth/cooking/showers you enjoy...



I checked into it last year and there was no charge for me.  I'm under 100 feet from the road though.

Matt


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## Como

Why not get them to run the service to the edge of your property, install the meter and take it from there?


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## DAKSY

Como said:
			
		

> Why not get them to run the service to the edge of your property, install the meter and take it from there?



In NY , a gas company WILL NOT install a gas meter unless there is an 
appliance connected to the downstream side of the meter bar. 
Only THEN they will install the meter & unlock the gas flow shut off.


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## jeff_t

I looked into out a few years ago, as the gas line is across the road. They sent me a packet on how to measure everything and figure up my own cost. I said 'Wtf? This is gonna cost me thousands and you can't send somebody out?' I guess with the <$200/year I now spend on propane to cook and dry clothes, I'm not concerned about it.


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## Trouthead

Last summer the gas company said they would install gas to our subdivision in Wyoming for about $2000.00 a piece if 5 customers wanted it.  The nearest gas line is 3/10s of a mile from my house.  That cost was to the edge of the property with the rest being the homeowners resposibility.  Three of us rented a trencher and trenched out own property.  The gas company installed all the piping and meters for a total cost each of $2100.00.  With my share of the trencher the toal cam to $2200.00 and a sore back from trenching about 300-500 ft.  Trenchers are no fun.

All in all it was worth it.  Two gas bills so far, $76.00 and $66.00.  Electricity went from $250.00 to $90.00.  No more wood hassles, and I don't ever hear my wife way, "I am cold"

$50,000.00 is just crazy.  Something can't be right.


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## 49er

The cost sure does seem to vary in different parts of the country, I have a friend that moved to Idaho recently and he needed about a 100' line run to his house. If he was going to be hooking up a heating appliance, the gas company would have done it for free but since he was only connecting a gas range they charged him $500.00 for the connection. I haven't pursued this any further at our house because I don't think that we could get the cost low enough to ever break even.


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## hemlock

$100 per foot?  Are they installing it by HDD?


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## 49er

hemlock said:
			
		

> $100 per foot?  Are they installing it by HDD?




I'm not sure what HDD is, is that where they bore underground? I don't think that's what they were going to do because she said that was one area that we might be able to save some money on if we had someone else dig the trench.


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## Como

Horizontal Directional Drilling.

The DIY cost can not be much more than $5 a ft. 

If there was a trench in situ, how long would it take? An hour?


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## certified106

Wow and i thought my 9,000 dollar estimate was high! I even have the line down to the road for them so it's about a 25 foot hookup. I hate utility companies


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## jimbom

$50,000.  That would be half the annual Natural Gas department operating budget in our town.

They just raised a connection in our town to a flat $175.00.  If the price is high, you won't get any new customers.

Municipal owned.  Two gas men and one truck for NG.  Part of a small utilities crew that runs muni water, sewer, gas, and electric.  One superintendent and consolidated billing that includes city solid waste.

We put in the system in 1992 using what was generously termed a build-design(instead of design-build) approach with in-house men and equipment.  It was paid for free and clear in 2005.  We have about 1000 connections out of about 1800 possible.  In 2001 we attracted a 1.1 million square foot facility with 1100 jobs.  The gas distribution system is so robust that we had only to tap the line in the street to heat the entire place.  That is a nice little addition to the income column.  I gave them their connection for free.

We have never had a significant finding on the Federal DOT tri-annual inspection.  The two gas men spend most of their time running pointless leak surveys and preparing reams of paperwork for the federal inspection.  Procedures created for decades old systems laid with black iron pipe.  But still are required of modern systems built of indestructible poly.  Government regulation.  Ain't it great.

We are proud of our little town and our volunteer ways of doing things.  Poor folk have poor ways, but they work for us.  $50,000.  Gaaaaaaak.


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## k0wtz

could i make a suggestion consider a high e heat pump.  we put in a 16seer by goodman. el. bill went up 28,00 over last year when we burned wood.  needless to say no more chain saw and tractor and splitter needed.

i still cant believe it

bob


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## coolidge

I got a price for the Directional Drilling, 100 feet long, the price came back at just over 5 grand.   NO THANKS


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## madrone

Holy Shlemoly! No charge to me when the gas co. ran a line from the neighbor's. Happy to have another one on the line, I guess. It took a crew of 3 or four, and they ran it under the road and another 20 feet to the house. Not sure what it cost them, but I'm guessing they haven't made it back yet.


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## rowerwet

and they wonder why CA is losing population...


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## mrjohneel

My residential street outside of Boston has gas along it but the road had a complete overhaul two years ago with new grading, paving, and granite curbing, etc. As part of that there is a four-year DPW moratorium on cutting into the road for utility upgrades (emergencies excepted of course). I was pricing a conversion form oil to gas but the quesiton was moot -- my highway department said we're not allowing anyone to cut into the new road. (So I bought a pellet stove.)


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## Panhandler

DAKSY said:
			
		

> Como said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Why not get them to run the service to the edge of your property, install the meter and take it from there?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In NY , a gas company WILL NOT install a gas meter unless there is an
> appliance connected to the downstream side of the meter bar.
> Only THEN they will install the meter & unlock the gas flow shut off.
Click to expand...


Here in these parts, they actually have to light the appliance the day they turn on the gas.


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## bja105

I would call a few plumbing contractors and ask if they do this kind of work.  If the utility works like ours, the plumber runs the trench, pipes it inside and outside, and calls for an inspection and hookup.  I can't imagine it being that expensive, even in California!

I just ran a line 280' to our gas well.  Borrowed equipment and labor from a friend.  I bought the pipe, two regulators, furnace conversion, inside piping, and meter for under $1500.  Strangely, When the gas company buys gas from you, they make you buy the household meter.  
The piping is not a DIY job, I'm in the trade, and had help from a master plumber.


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