Oil change

Oil to gas?

There’s no easy answer to the conversion conundrum, according to a top state energy official, but with heating oil at historically high prices, an increasing number of Massachusetts homeowners with oil tanks in their basements are pondering the switch.

“The issue of getting your home converted from oil to natural gas is kind of complicated right now,” said Philip Giudice, commissioner of the state’s Department of Energy Resources.

But there is less uncertainty about the prices of natural gas and oil this coming winter – they are going to remain high, according to the latest predictions from the Energy Information Administration, a statistical arm of the federal Department of Energy. Heating oil is expected to average $4.34 a gallon compared with $3.31 last season; natural gas prices will average $15.58 per thousand cubic feet, up from $12.72.

Boston Globe