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On April 24, the Department of Energy (DOE) published its representative average unit costs of five residential energy sources for the year 2018 pursuant to the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA). The five sources are electricity, natural gas, No. 2 heating oil, propane, and kerosene. These are the dollar costs that DOE will use when determining consumer cost and savings associated with a proposed minimum energy efficiency standard. These numbers are also used by manufacturers for the cost estimates that are found on the yellow energy savings label every appliance is required to display. 

Because DOE publishes these numbers annually, APGA staff was able to go back to 2000 and chart how these numbers have changed over the past 18 years. Since 2012, natural gas prices have been fairly flat at approximately $10 per a million Btu, whereas electricity has continued a steady increase and heating oil, kerosene and propane have seen wild price fluctuations. Over the last 18 years, the price difference between electricity and natural gas has grown from approximately $20 per a million Btu to nearly $29 per a million Btu in 2018. .

For more information on DOE’s average energy cost please contact Dan Lapato of APGA staff by phone at 202-464-2742 or by email at dlapato@apga.org.