Piedmont Wants to Absorb ENCNG

RALEIGH — Piedmont Natural Gas Co. wants to merge a taxpayer-subsidized, money-losing gas venture into its overall customer base, which could permanently inflate its rates, according to one of its own witnesses in a case before the North Carolina Utilities Commission. Dr. Mitch Renkow, a professor of resource economics at N.C. State University, said he thinks "there is a substantial probability that (Eastern North Carolina Natural Gas) will never become economically viable." If the ENCNG territory, extended through 14 counties in northeast North Carolina, could never turn a profit with its customer base, then all of Piedmont's remaining customers in the state would have to subsidize it.