Who We Are

Gas Alberta Inc. is a private corporation owned by 79 natural gas utilities in Alberta . The Company’s primary mandate is to aggregate natural gas supplies for resale to its shareholders.

We are proud to be an important part of Alberta ’s rural heritage, and will continue to provide our customers with a reliable and economic supply of natural gas.

Background

Early Rural Utilities

The opportunity for developing Alberta ’s rural gas systems arose in the mid 1950’s, when Alberta Gas Trunk Line Company (now TransCanada Pipelines Limited) expanded its pipeline system throughout Alberta . Small gas distribution systems were constructed and operated by local co-operatives in the early 1960’s to serve rural consumers.

By 1970, twenty-five small gas co-ops provided service to approximately 20% of rural Albertans. The remaining rural consumers continued to burn propane, fuel oil, wood, or coal. These alternate fuels were expensive, and often unreliable and inconvenient.

Rural Gas Program

The Alberta Government decided to extend the benefits of natural gas to remaining towns, villages and agricultural areas in the province. Alberta had a plentiful supply of natural gas, and over 120,000 km of pipelines that formed an extensive gas gathering and transmission grid.

In 1973, the Alberta Government established the Rural Gas Program to construct gas distribution systems, and provide funds to gas distributors with higher costs associated with serving sparsely populated rural areas. Government grants available through this new program offset approximately 60% of the rural utilities’ costs for constructing distribution systems.

The Rural Gas Program led to the formation of rural franchise areas to establish an orderly development of rural gas distribution systems and ensure a minimum customer base and economic viability for each distribution system. Rural gas distributors had an exclusive right and responsibility to offer service, where economically feasible, to all potential rural and urban residential customers not having natural gas service prior to 1973.

Formation of Gas Alberta

The Alberta Government recognized the complexities of the gas supply industry and difficulties that small gas utilities may encounter in negotiating and securing reliable and economical natural gas supplies. In addition, the Rural Gas Program required that natural gas be sold to rural gas distributors at a common price. To address these concerns, the Alberta Government created Gas Alberta in 1973 as an agency of Alberta Transportation and Utilities to secure gas supplies for rural distributors.

As a natural gas aggregator for a large number of utilities, Gas Alberta could negotiate favorable gas contracts with its suppliers and ensure that gas distributors received year-round gas supplies at a reasonable cost and a common unit price.

The Rural Gas Program resulted in rapid growth of gas distribution systems throughout the 1980’s and 1990’s, and natural gas became the fuel of choice for rural Alberta consumers. The Province became unique for its large network of member-owned and member-operated gas utilities.

Privatization of the Company

During the 1990’s, the Alberta Government decided to end their direct involvement with the purchase and sale of natural gas. In 1997, rural utilities in Alberta provided funds to purchase and privatize Gas Alberta , pay for Company start-up costs, and finance operations.

On October 30, 1997 , Gas Alberta Inc. was incorporated as a private company that operated independently from the Alberta Government. Employees were relocated from Edmonton to Calgary , and Gas Alberta Inc. commenced operations on July 1, 1998 .

Current Operations

Today, Gas Alberta Inc. is the exclusive natural gas supplier to its 79 shareholders, comprised of gas co-ops, municipalities, counties and First Nation gas utilities. The Company provides gas supplies to approximately 75% of the natural gas franchise areas in Alberta , a population over 300,000. Our shareholders’ gas distribution system exceeds 90,000 kilometers of pipelines; the largest rural gas system in the world .

Gas Alberta Inc. and its customers form a seamless network to secure, transport, and distribute natural gas from suppliers to end-users.

Our customers have offices located within their franchise areas, with each utility having between 100 and 5,000 members. Local utilities offer a wide range of services to their end-users, including installation of primary and secondary pipelines, meter installations, gas leak detection, emergency gas supplies and appliance sales.

Consumers use natural gas for such purposes as domestic heating, farming, ranching, irrigation, grain drying, greenhouses and sawmills.