label: Choice Gas

Thirty-four percent.

That's how many of the Choice Gas program's 66,200 customers had made an active rate selection as of noon Thursday, just 60 hours before the end of this year's Choice Gas selection period, according the Choice Gas Web site (www.choicegas.com).

Customers have until 11:59 p.m. Saturday to make a Choice Gas selection, said Norm Long, a senior representative with Kinder Morgan, the utility that facilitates the program.

Last year, 42,700, or 64.5 percent, of the program's customers actively chose a fixed rate, market-index rate, negotiated rate or the pass-on rate. As of Thursday, the participation level in the program was down 18,743 customers from last year.

Of course, this difference may change significantly: Customers still have today and Saturday to make a selection.

"Typically, the last three or four days is when the majority of the decisions are made," Long said.

Long has wondered how customers would react to the fact that the pass-on rate was the least expensive Choice Gas option the last two years, and because the pass-on rate is the default rate, no active selection has to be made to select it.

The pass-on rate works much the same way the gas utility did in the days before Choice Gas. Any rate adjustment made to the pass-on rate must be approved by the Wyoming Public Service Commission. The utility arm of Kinder Morgan, which administers the rate, must pass on the cost it pays to acquire gas for the pass-on rate to its customers on a dollar-for-dollar basis.

Currently, the pass-on rate in the program's Casper division, which includes Laramie, Riverton and Rawlins, is 45.9 cents per therm.

In the program's Torrington Division, the pass-on rate is currently 93.4 cents per therm, and in the Gillette Division it is 75.2 cents per therm.

These pass-on rates will probably remain unchanged until June 1, the date when this year's Choice Gas selections take effect and the date the Public Service Commission makes its next ruling on pass-on rate adjustments.

On Thursday, the lowest fixed rate being offered to the program's Casper division customers, 62.5 cents a therm, was 16.6 cents per therm higher than the current Casper pass-on rate.

Fixed rates are Choice Gas rate options whereby customers lock in the per-therm price they pay for their gas for the entire year.

However, in the Torrington division, the lowest fixed rate being offered Thursday, at 80.8 cents a therm, was 12.6 cents per therm less than the current Torrington pass-on rate.

And in the Gillette division, the current pass-on rate and the lowest fixed rate being offered Thursday, at 76.9 cents a therm, were relatively close.

As was the case last year, the differences among the fixed rates being offered by the five suppliers this year are minuscule.

For example, the low fixed rate in the Casper division, 62.5 cents a therm - a price offered by Wyoming Community Gas, the Public Alliance for Community Energy (ACE) and Midwest United Energy - was only 0.4 cents less than the high fixed rate of 62.9 cents per therm offered by Kinder Morgan Choice Gas Supply.

Customers can sign up for a Choice Gas rate via telephone by calling (800) 804-0925, by Internet at www.choicegas.com, or by mailing in their selection form.