Pittsburgh-area natural gas capacity: two gas utilities, both with thin peak-day margins

By Sam Strong, Vice President of Business Development, Discovery Energy. Technical review by Tara Dugger, Chief Operating Officer. Updated October 2026.

Metro used: the Pittsburgh, PA metropolitan statistical area, as delineated in OMB Bulletin No. 23-01 (July 21, 2023): Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Butler, Fayette, Lawrence, Washington and Westmoreland counties. Two gas utilities list all eight counties in their tariffs: Peoples Natural Gas Company LLC (Peoples), together with ten counties outside the metro, and Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania, Inc. (Columbia Gas PA), which lists more counties across Pennsylvania. The design-day and peak-day figures below are for each utility's whole system, so items outside the metro are labeled system context.⁵¹⁰

Key takeaways

Which parts of the record fall inside the Pittsburgh metro?

Peoples' filed tariff lists 18 counties. Eight of them are the Pittsburgh metro's eight counties, so the serving utility is identified for the whole metro; how much of each county's population Peoples serves is not shown.⁵

Columbia Gas PA's tariff also lists all eight metro counties: it says it is certified to serve in all cities, boroughs and townships in Allegheny, Beaver, Fayette and Washington counties, and lists named municipalities in Armstrong, Butler, Lawrence and Westmoreland counties. A certificate of this kind does not show where Columbia Gas PA has customers, and the filings reviewed give no customer count by county, so its share of the metro is not established.¹⁰

Counties in Peoples' and Columbia Gas PA's tariff territories, by whether they are in the Pittsburgh metro (OMB delineation). Sources: Peoples tariff, R-2026-3060855; Columbia Gas PA tariff, Gas - Pa. P.U.C. No. 9.⁵¹⁰

System context: every design-day and peak-day figure on this page is utility-wide, Peoples-wide or Columbia Gas PA-wide. The record does not allocate any of it to the eight metro counties.

How much spare gas capacity does Pittsburgh have on the coldest day?

Peoples uses a regression model with a design-day average temperature of minus 9°F, and said that, using send-out data for the four years ended May 2024, it calculated a total system peak-day design requirement of 1,487.6 MMcf per day.¹

Peoples' design-day requirement and supply, system-wide, from its March 2026 testimony. The last row is our subtraction: 1,487.6 minus (1,192.1 plus 294.8).²

Peoples said its design-day supply assets will be "within 0.73 MMcf of its design day requirements". The testimony does not say whether that is above or below, and a margin this small is below the Outlook Scale's 5% thin-margin threshold. It also does not show a need date, a shortfall year or a project.²

Interstate delivered gas comes from Equitrans, Eastern Gas Transmission and Storage, Tennessee Gas Pipeline Company, LLC, Texas Eastern Transmission Company, Columbia Gas Transmission and National Fuel Gas Supply Corporation, according to Peoples. The testimony gives one combined figure.³

What is driving new natural gas demand?

Peoples said that data center and power generation inquiries have grown recently, that it has added no such project since its last rate case, and that no project has a signed agreement. It proposes no special treatment for these loads in this case and calls any specific request premature. Peoples' own record contains no service date for any new large load.⁷

New load documented in the metro: the Shippingport Lateral. On August 29, 2025, National Fuel filed a request with FERC, in docket CP25-541-000, to build about 7.26 miles of 24-inch pipeline, a delivery point and a tie-in in Beaver and Mercer counties, to provide 205,000 Dth per day of incremental firm transportation to a new interconnection with the Shippingport Power Station; Beaver County is one of the eight metro counties and Mercer is not.¹⁸ National Fuel's project page says pipeline construction began in March 2026 and gives a target in-service date of fall 2026.¹⁸ The project's owner, Frontier Group of Companies, says Shippingport Power Station will be a coal-to-gas conversion generating 2,550 MW for the PJM grid, with the National Fuel lateral anticipated to be complete by November 2026 and the conversion complete in the fourth quarter of 2028 or first quarter of 2029; these are owner statements, not filings.¹⁹

National Fuel Gas Supply is one of the six interstate pipelines Peoples named, but the filings reviewed do not say that this load draws on gas that Peoples or Columbia Gas PA contracts, and they give no figure comparing it with either utility's design-day margin, so this page states no effect on either margin.³ The record read includes no state air permit for the plant; the owner's page lists an air permit as "to be submitted."¹⁹

A search of other official records found no further documented load in the metro: EIA's September 2026 generator inventory lists no planned natural gas-fired generator in the eight metro counties, and PJM's Transition Cycle 1 Phase III list shows eight Pennsylvania projects, all solar or solar with storage.²⁰ System context: in Indiana County, outside the metro, DEP issued a final air plan approval on November 18, 2025 (number in Note 20) for seven combined-cycle and ten simple-cycle gas turbines at the former Homer City station, and EIA's inventory lists planned operation from July 2028; DEP's memo does not name the pipeline that will supply it.²⁰

The other change Peoples describes is on the supply side: conventional-well gas delivered into its systems fell from about 37.1 Bcf in 2020 to about 26.2 Bcf in 2025, and it does not expect a reversal.⁴

What does the record show for Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania, the metro's second gas utility?

Columbia Gas PA's February 2026 gas supply filing sets firm peak-day capacity against the design-day demand of its Sales and CHOICE customers, which it says are about 76% of its total design-day demand; the rest is delivery service demand, which the table does not compare with capacity.¹¹

Columbia Gas PA's firm peak-day capacity and demand by contract year, system-wide, from Exhibit 5, Table 4 of its February 2026 filing, in MDth per day.¹¹

Every year in the table is below the Outlook Scale's 5% thin-margin threshold. For 2026-27 the printed difference is 18.1 while the table's own net capacity less total demand is 16.8; the table does not explain the difference. The table shows no negative balance.¹¹

Three items in the same filing are specific to the Pittsburgh area. First, Columbia Gas PA said the market served by its Eastern Gas Transmission and Storage Warrendale delivery point and its Tennessee Gas Pipeline Bradford Woods (also called Pitt Terminal) delivery point needs additional capacity to supply the design day demand, and that it contracted 10,500 Dth per day of winter-only firm capacity from November 1, 2025 through March 31, 2026, which may be renewed or replaced by other options; the filing does not say what applies for winter 2026-27. Bradford Woods is listed under Allegheny County in the tariff's municipality list, and the U.S. Geological Survey's Geographic Names Information System lists Warrendale as a populated place in Allegheny County, also inside the metro. Columbia Gas PA also said it is subject to hourly flow restrictions on the Eastern Gas Transmission and Storage pipeline and continues to evaluate capacity and supply options in its Warrendale and State College markets to address the hourly demand requirements on that pipeline.¹²¹⁷

Second, Columbia Gas PA said its two Tennessee Gas Pipeline contracts serve portions of its Newcastle and Pittsburgh area markets, and that it renewed the 16,000 Dth per day contract for the Newcastle market with a new expiration date of October 31, 2029. New Castle is in Lawrence County, inside the metro. The record shows no replacement after that date. Under the Outlook Scale's expiring supply test a contract counts only if it is key: 10% or more of design day, or 10% or more of the utility's firm interstate pipeline capacity. By our calculation (by code, from Table 4), 16,000 Dth per day is 2.5% of the 635.5 MDth per day of total design-day demand and 7.3% of the 220.2 MDth per day of firm transportation capacity, net of releases, for 2026-27, and no more than that in any of the four contract years in the table. Both are below 10%, so the contract is not counted as a risk factor; it stays a development to watch.¹¹¹²

Third, system context: Columbia Gas PA said it received no bids to replace a Texas Eastern contract of 14,835 Dth per day for markets it names as Delmont, Rockwood and Pleasant Gap, and renewed it through October 31, 2026. The record does not locate those markets by county, so the item is not counted for the Pittsburgh metro.¹²

What does this mean for business gas costs?

The record gives no dollar or bill figure for capacity costs by customer class, so none is given here. These are the positions and rules on file:

• Peoples asked in March 2026 for a general rate increase of approximately $163.2 million per year.⁸
• The administrative law judges' recommended decision, which is not a Commission order, would produce an annual revenue increase of about $105.4 million (8.90%) if the Commission agrees, with tariffs effective December 26, 2026.⁸
• The recommended decision recommends that the Commission adopt the Office of Consumer Advocate's cost-of-service study and its recommended allocation of the increase among the classes; it is a recommendation, and the record read shows no class-level effect.⁸
• Under Peoples' tariff, essential-human-needs (Priority One) customers who buy from a supplier get design-day capacity from Peoples and pay for it through a capacity charge per Mcf; non-Priority One transportation customers, generally its largest, acquire their own design-day assets and pay a balancing charge per Mcf.¹

Columbia Gas PA's most recent base rate case in the record is its 2024 case: on November 21, 2024 the Commission approved, without modification, a partial settlement allowing $74 million a year in additional base rate revenue, instead of the $124.1 million first requested. This is a 2024 case, system-wide, and the class allocation was not read for this page.¹³

Who bears the cost of any future capacity addition is not decided in this record.

Who gets gas first in a shortage?

Peoples' tariff Rule 17 covers an emergency in which firm demand exceeds the gas or capacity lawfully available and threatens service to Priority One customers. It allows the company to require each commercial and industrial customer that is not Priority One to reduce consumption, with the reduction set "without regard to priorities of use". The authorized volume is the minimum firm volume needed to prevent damage to plant equipment.⁹

Takes above authorized consumption during an emergency curtailment are penalized: above 103% and up to 110%, the higher of $10 per Mcf or 110% of the highest-cost gas supply purchased that month; above 110%, the higher of $25 per Mcf or 125%. Tariff exposure, no penalty shown assessed.⁹

Columbia Gas PA's tariff says that, if time permits, before requiring reductions it will use reasonable efforts to interrupt all interruptible services, issue operational flow and matching orders and alerts, and call for voluntary reductions. If it then curtails commercial and industrial customers that are not Priority 1, the curtailment is made "without regard to priorities of use", does not go below plant protection use, and lasts no more than five business days unless the Commission extends it.¹⁴

Winter and market context

Context only, as of October 2026. It does not set the outlook level and makes no prediction of outages. Its sources are listed separately under Market and weather sources and are refreshed on the publication date.

NOAA's Climate Prediction Center said on October 15, 2026 that its November 2026 to January 2027 temperature outlook favors above-normal temperatures for regions it calls the Ohio Valley and mid-Atlantic, and that the probability of at least a strong El Niño continuing through January to March 2027 is 80%; its discussion names regions, not Pennsylvania counties.^B1 The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said on October 6, 2026 that it expects U.S. natural gas inventories to enter the winter heating season 2% above the previous five-year average, and that prolonged periods of cold weather could increase withdrawals beyond its forecast.^A1A2 EIA lists U.S. liquefied natural gas gross exports of 15 billion cubic feet per day in 2025, 18 in 2026 and 19 in 2027.^A1 These are national and regional facts, not statements about the utility's system, and none of them is used to set the outlook on this page.

What is the outlook for Pittsburgh gas capacity through 2029?

Discovery Energy rates the outlook for Pittsburgh-area natural gas capacity through 2029 as High (confidence: Medium): the base level is Elevated, since Peoples' own design-day plan leaves a stated margin of 0.73 MMcf on a requirement of 1,487.6 MMcf per day and Columbia Gas PA's firm peak-day table shows capacity about 2.8% above demand for winter 2026-27, both below the thin-margin threshold, Columbia Gas PA says a Pittsburgh-area market needs additional capacity, and the record shows no approved or scheduled fix, and two documented risk factors raise it by one step, the most the Outlook Scale allows; the record also shows no unmet need date and no signed large load in Peoples' filing, and every figure is system-wide. Documented risk factors: an upstream limit (F5), since Columbia Gas PA says it is subject to hourly flow restrictions on the Eastern Gas Transmission and Storage pipeline and is evaluating capacity options for its Warrendale market, in Allegheny County; and new load ahead of the fix (F4), since National Fuel Gas Supply, one of the six interstate pipelines Peoples names, asked FERC in August 2025 to approve 205,000 Dth per day of incremental firm transportation to the Shippingport Power Station in Beaver County, inside the metro, with construction under way, a target in-service date of fall 2026, and no approved or scheduled fix for either utility's margin in the record; two factors raise the base level of Elevated by one step, which is the most the scale allows. Columbia Gas PA's Tennessee Gas Pipeline contract for its Newcastle market, which expires on October 31, 2029, is not counted as expiring supply (F2): it is 7.3% of Columbia Gas PA's firm transportation capacity and 2.5% of its design-day demand, below the 10% test for a key contract. Three developments would change the assessment: the Commission's final order in the Peoples rate case and Peoples' next design-day supply stack, including any approved or scheduled capacity addition or any change to the 0.73 MMcf margin; whether Columbia Gas PA renews or adds capacity for the Warrendale and Bradford Woods delivery points and replaces the Newcastle contract that expires in October 2029; any data center or power generation agreement signed with a service date and county.

Outlook levels, from least to most concern: Stable, Watch, Elevated, High, Severe. Levels describe the public record of capacity and supply risk; confidence is reported separately. They are qualitative assessments, not forecasts of outages.

What should Pittsburgh-area facilities check now?

• Tariffs and charges, through a utility audit. Confirm each account is on the right rate class and tariff, and that riders, demand charges and capacity-related charges are billed correctly. Over 70% of the clients Discovery Energy has audited were billed incorrectly. An audit verifies tariffs and charges and recovers overcharges before winter costs rise.
• Which utility, and which rate class. Confirm whether each site is served by Peoples or Columbia Gas PA, since both list every county in the metro.
• Priority One or not. Confirm whether each account is Priority One or a commercial or industrial account that Rule 17 (Peoples) or Rule 2.3 (Columbia Gas PA) can curtail, and who is responsible for design-day gas on transportation accounts.
• Firm or interruptible, and the terms. Know the notice, authorized-volume and penalty terms in Rule 17 before the first cold snap.
• Backup plans and fuel. Check that alternate-fuel and curtailment plans are current and feasible, and that fuel inventories and resupply arrangements are in place before December.
• Upcoming proceedings. Track the Commission's final order in the Peoples rate case, with new rates proposed for December 26, 2026, and ask Columbia Gas PA whether the 10,500 Dth per day Warrendale and Bradford Woods capacity applies this winter.

Frequently asked questions

Related case studies

Discovery Energy publishes gas capacity case studies for other metros, using the same method and outlook scale.

• South-central Pennsylvania natural gas capacity case study (outlook: Elevated)
• York natural gas capacity case study (outlook: Elevated)
• Detroit natural gas capacity case study (outlook: High)
• Boston natural gas capacity case study (outlook: High)

Notes

1. Peoples Statement No. 5, Direct Testimony of Edward A. Palombo, Volume VIII, Pa. PUC docket R-2026-3060855, filed March 27, 2026: PDF 114 (design-day temperature, requirement and supply), PDF 115 to 116 (Priority One, NP-1 and cost recovery). Utility statements. [PIT-01, PIT-02, PIT-14 to PIT-16] ↩
2. Same filing, PDF 114 to 116. 1,192.1 plus 294.8 is 1,486.9; 1,487.6 minus 1,486.9 is 0.7 MMcf, or 0.05% of the requirement. Illustrative, run by code (pittsburgh_calculations.csv); the testimony's own "within 0.73 MMcf" is the stated figure. [PIT-03, PIT-06, PIT-07] ↩
3. Same filing, PDF 113 (six interstate pipelines) and PDF 114 (1,127.9 MMcf). 1,127.9 divided by 1,487.6 is 75.8%; illustrative. [PIT-04, PIT-08] ↩
4. Same filing, PDF 117. About 37.1 Bcf in 2020 and about 26.2 Bcf in 2025; 10.9 of 37.1 is 29.4%, shown as 29%. [PIT-09] ↩
5. Peoples tariff, Gas-Pa. P.U.C. No. 49, Description of Territory (Exhibit KMS-1), Volume VIII PDF 317 to 323: 18 counties, 8 in the metro and 10 outside (pittsburgh_metro_classification.csv); county boundaries from OMB Bulletin No. 23-01 via the metro master file. Statement No. 1 says 18 counties. [PIT-10] ↩
6. Same filing, PDF 113; Punxsutawney is listed under Jefferson County in the tariff, PDF 321. [PIT-11] ↩
7. Peoples Statement No. 8, Direct Testimony of Luke Ravenstahl, Volume VIII PDF 181 to 182. [PIT-12, PIT-13] ↩
8. Recommended Decision of the administrative law judges, R-2026-3060855: PDF 27 (finding of fact 1), PDF 386 (ordering paragraph 2), PDF 390 (cost allocation). A recommendation, not a Commission order; exceptions were filed in 2026 and the Commission has not ruled in the record reviewed. [PIT-17 to PIT-19] ↩
9. Peoples tariff Rule 17, Emergency Curtailment, Volume VIII PDF 337 to 340. Tariff exposure, not an assessed penalty. [PIT-20 to PIT-23] ↩
10. Columbia Gas PA tariff, Gas - Pa. P.U.C. No. 9, Description of Territory, as filed in Volume 5 of its March 2024 rate filing (PDF 20 to 23): all eight metro counties are listed (pittsburgh_columbia_classification.csv); the tariff says "certified", which is not a customer count. [PIT-24 to PIT-26] ↩
11. Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania, Inc., Docket R-2026-3060762 (gas cost proceeding), 30-day 1307(f) pre-filing dated February 27, 2026, Exhibit No. 5, Table 4 (PDF 171), system-wide, in MDth per day. The printed 2026-27 difference is 18.1; the printed net capacity less printed total demand is 16.8; illustrative, run by code (pittsburgh_calculations.csv); the firm transportation subtotal (net of releases) is the Firm Transportation subtotal line of the same table. [PIT-27 to PIT-29, PIT-73] ↩
12. Same exhibit, Adding or Replacing Capacity and the Texas Eastern and Tennessee Gas Pipeline contracts (PDF 173 and 174); hourly flow restrictions on the Eastern Gas Transmission and Storage pipeline (PDF 172) and the Warrendale and State College markets (PDF 173). [PIT-30 to PIT-34, PIT-41, PIT-42] ↩
13. Joint Petition for Partial Settlement (PDF 7) and Commission Opinion and Order entered November 21, 2024 (PDF 4), Docket R-2024-3046519. [PIT-35, PIT-36] ↩
14. Columbia Gas PA tariff Rule 2.3.3, Emergency Actions Curtailments, Volume 5 PDF 48. [PIT-37 to PIT-39] ↩
15. Not established for Columbia Gas PA: customer counts or load by Pittsburgh-metro county; whether the Warrendale and Bradford Woods capacity was renewed for winter 2026-27; where Delmont, Rockwood and Pleasant Gap lie in relation to the metro; the 2026 settlement and order in docket R-2026-3060762 (not read).
16. Not established, and left out of the page: supply events since 2020 affecting Peoples (no named event in the 466-page testimony; search terms Winter Storm, Elliott, Uri, operational flow order, critical notice and polar vortex returned none that concern a supply event); remedies and capacity projects (none found in the testimony reviewed); delivery-point utilization from pipeline postings (the pipelines' posting sites could not be read by script, and no matched capacity and scheduled quantity data were retrieved). Peoples' earlier rate case R-2023-3044549 was not read, so any change in its design-day standard is not assessed.
17. U.S. Geological Survey, Geographic Names Information System, Domestic Names, Pennsylvania (downloaded October 24, 2026), line 13982: Warrendale, Populated Place, Allegheny County (FIPS 42003); Allegheny County is one of the eight metro counties (metro_counties.csv). [PIT-43] ↩
18. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Federal Register notice 2025-17571 (90 FR 44056, September 11, 2025), National Fuel Gas Supply Corporation, Docket CP25-541-000 (prior notice request filed August 29, 2025); National Fuel Gas Company, Shippingport Lateral Project page (timeline and target in-service date; saved October 25, 2026). The notice shows the request, not FERC's action on it; whether FERC authorization has been issued is not established here, because FERC's eLibrary does not allow scripted access. [PIT-44, PIT-45, PIT-46, PIT-47, PIT-48, PIT-49, PIT-50] ↩
19. Frontier Group of Companies, Shippingport Industrial Park page (saved October 25, 2026): project-owner statements, not filings. [PIT-51, PIT-52, PIT-53, PIT-54] ↩
20. Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, Homer City Generation Site Redevelopment page and Technical Review Memo for plan approval 32-00457A (November 18, 2025); EIA-860M inventory for September 2026 (Planned sheet, operator-reported planned dates), filtered to the eight metro counties by code; PJM Transition Cycle 1 Phase III project list (Pennsylvania rows; no county column), computed by code (pittsburgh_calculations.csv). [PIT-55, PIT-56, PIT-57, PIT-58, PIT-59, PIT-60] ↩
21. R3 not established, and left out of the claims (searches run: EIA-860M, PJM Transition Cycle 1, Federal Register FERC notices, DEP and Pennsylvania Bulletin web searches): a state air plan approval for Shippingport Power Station; the Pennsylvania Bulletin does not allow scripted access, and a stormwater permit notice for its gas fuel yard in the October 24, 2026 issue was seen only in a blog digest and not read in the Bulletin; PJM's Cycle 1 (2026) applications by county, which PJM does not publish in a form code could save; FERC's action on CP25-541-000; and the gas supply source for Homer City. News reports of an Aligned Data Centers campus at Shippingport are leads only and are not claimed. Manual downloads are listed in batches/PJM-01/tara_review_addendum.md.

Market and weather sources

Public web sources saved and hashed on October 25, 2026. They are context, separate from the regulatory record cited in the Notes. The Climate Prediction Center issues its seasonal outlook once each month near mid-month; this section is refreshed on the publication date.

1. A1. U.S. Energy Information Administration, press release, "EIA expects a mixed picture for winter fuel costs this year," October 6, 2026. Link ↩
2. A2. U.S. Energy Information Administration, Short-Term Energy Outlook, October 2026 (natural gas storage). Link ↩
3. B1. NOAA Climate Prediction Center, Prognostic Discussion for Long-Lead Seasonal Outlooks, issued October 15, 2026. Link ↩

Sources

1. Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, docket R-2026-3060762, Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania, Inc.: 30-day 1307(f) pre-filing and supporting information, Exhibit No. 5. Link
2. Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, docket R-2024-3046519, Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania, Inc.: Volume 5 (tariff Pa. P.U.C. No. 9), Joint Petition for Settlement and Opinion and Order. Link, Link, Link
3. Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, docket R-2026-3060855, Peoples Natural Gas Company LLC base rate case: Volume VIII, direct testimony Statements 1 to 14, with tariff Gas-Pa. P.U.C. No. 49. Link
4. Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, docket R-2026-3060855, Recommended Decision. Link
5. Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, docket page for R-2026-3060855. Link
6. U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Board on Geographic Names, Geographic Names Information System, Domestic Names, Pennsylvania. Link
7. Office of Management and Budget, OMB Bulletin No. 23-01, Revised Delineations of Metropolitan Statistical Areas, Micropolitan Statistical Areas, and Combined Statistical Areas, July 21, 2023.
8. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Federal Register notice 2025-17571, National Fuel Gas Supply Corporation, Docket CP25-541-000. Link
9. National Fuel Gas Company, Shippingport Lateral Project. Link
10. Frontier Group of Companies, Shippingport Industrial Park. Link
11. Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, Homer City Generation Site Redevelopment. Link
12. U.S. Energy Information Administration, EIA-860M Preliminary Monthly Electric Generator Inventory, September 2026. Link
13. PJM Interconnection, Transition Cycle 1 Phase III Executive Summary. Link