Maryland propane prices

Maryland's propane demand sits at the two ends of the state, the Eastern Shore and the western mountain counties, with the Baltimore and Washington suburbs in between running mostly on natural gas. Delmarva poultry houses add a fall and winter load that does not track the thermostat the way homes do. Supply comes off Chesapeake and Delaware River terminals and the pipeline network that serves the mid-Atlantic.

EIA builds this number by calling retail dealers in Maryland each week of the October to March heating season and averaging what they report, published Wednesday afternoon. The survey stops for the summer and picks back up in October. EIA also surveys a wholesale price for Maryland, plotted as the lower line. The distance between the two is the delivered-service stack, and it widens when the rack falls faster than dealers reprice. The Census Bureau's American Community Survey, on five-year estimates, puts propane as the main heating fuel in 3.8% of occupied Maryland homes, below the national middle.

The regional numbers around this price are Central Atlantic propane prices and Central Atlantic propane stocks, the inventory that has to cover the winter. The propane usage calculator will estimate your fill cost at this price: gallons per burner-hour from an appliance's rating, gallons a year, and how long a tank of a given size lasts between deliveries.