Minnesota propane prices

Minnesota is where the propane emergency of 2013-14 hit hardest. A wet corn harvest ran grain dryers flat out through the fall, brutal cold followed, and the Cochin pipeline was reversed that same year, removing a line that had carried Canadian propane into the upper Midwest. The state now leans on rail, truck and the pipeline system out of the Gulf Coast, with in-state storage carrying the peak. Almost all of the demand sits outside the Twin Cities gas system.

This is a surveyed average rather than a quote. EIA polls a sample of Minnesota propane dealers weekly through the October to March heating season and publishes the state figure Wednesday afternoon; the series then goes quiet until October. Two lines run on the chart because EIA surveys Minnesota dealers on both sides of the sale: what they pay at the rack and what they charge a residential customer. The lower line moves first, and the retail line follows it with a lag measured in weeks. The Census Bureau's American Community Survey, on five-year estimates, puts propane as the main heating fuel in 10.8% of occupied Minnesota homes, well above the national middle. That is a large block of homes to keep supplied through a cold January.

For context beyond one state, Minnesota sits in the Midwest district: regional prices and Midwest propane stocks. A price per gallon is not a delivery ticket. The propane usage calculator estimates gallons burned and what a fill costs at the current Minnesota survey price.