If you're thinking about signing with an alternative natural gas company to BGE, don't. As usual, the best choice seems to be to do nothing and stick with BGE's default service, in which the natural-gas price varies with the market from month to month. All the contracts I've been able to find that let you lock in a winter price seem too expensive. Washington Gas Energy Services will charge you a fixed-price of $0.999 per therm for 12 months or $1.02 per therm for 24 months. MXEnergy charges $0.963 per therm for 12 months. Novec Energy Solutions is offering $1.10 per therm for 12 months.

"A fixed gas price for 1 year eliminates the surprise of rising gas costs by providing guaranteed price protection," says WGES. Yeah, and it also eliminates the probabilty that you'll save money when spot nat-gas prices dip under the WGES price.

Check out the price history posted by BGE. You'll see that in the last year BGE's floating prices ranged from 60.4 cents per therm in October 2006 to $1.04 per therm in January 2007. True, two years ago, after Hurricane Katrina, they spiked -- to $1.63 that November and then to around $1.25 for December and January. But the most recent price is 71.59 cents per therm for this month, which is the lowest September price since 2004.

Natural-gas futures prices for this winter are a bit lower now than they were last September for last winter. That suggests that upcoming spot prices won't be much different from last winter. The Energy Department says East-Coast natural-gas stores are still near historical highs, which also portends moderate prices. My rosy little scenario would be upset, however, by a very cold winter, which would drive up nat-gas demand and price. A warm December and January helped keep last winter's gas price down. It would also be upset by a Hurricane Katrina repeat that disrupts Gulf-Coast pipelines, but it's getting late in the year for that.