While much of the equipment for delivering gas supply to your home or business is owned and maintained by Unitil, you as the property owner are responsible for maintaining some aspects of the service. Understanding how natural gas is delivered to your home or business can help you understand how to best care for your equipment, especially during emergencies.

A natural gas service connects the gas main to a customer’s gas regulator/meter. The regulator is a special valve designed to reduce pressure, as well as shut-off flow in the event of a gas pressure increase. The meter measures the demand or quantity of natural gas (as cubic feet) required by the appliances served in the structure.

A union or connection is where the meter is attached to the line or pipe entering the structure. Customers are responsible for the union and all lines after the union, including those within the structure. In some cases, the line from the meter to the structure is buried; however, the customer is also responsible for the maintenance of this line.

Our natural gas system is governed by Federal regulations, which recommend that customers with natural gas lines buried from the meter to the primary structure should be:

• Periodically inspected for leaks
• Periodically inspected for corrosion if the piping is metallic
• Repaired if any unsafe condition is discovered

Plumbing or heating contractors can assist customers in inspecting and repairing the buried piping.

When digging near buried gas piping, customers should locate the piping in advance and dig by hand, not machine. Call DigSafe® at 811 prior to any breaking of ground and review private locating services available courtesy of DigSafe®.