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Natural Gas Company Fined $50,000 By Maine Utilities Regulators

A natural gas company that serves more than 4,800 customers in Augusta and southern Maine has been fined $50,000 by state utility regulators and agreed to a number of specific steps to ensure compliance.

The Maine Public Utilities Commission approved a consent agreement Tuesday with Maine Natural Gas of Brunswick. PUC Chairman Phil Bartlett says the violations were related to quality control, assurances and testing.

“There were simply inadequate quality controls in place, a number of gaffes were identified by our gas safety staff,” he says.

Maine Natural Gas is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Avangrid, the parent company of Central Maine Power.

Bartlett calls the $50,000 penalty significant and commensurate with potential safety violations that occurred over a number of years. He says the commission wanted to a send the appropriate message that the problems had to be fixed.

Ed is a Maine native who spent his early childhood in Livermore Falls before moving to Farmington. He graduated from Mount Blue High School in 1970 before going to the University of Maine at Orono where he received his BA in speech in 1974 with a broadcast concentration. It was during that time that he first became involved with public broadcasting. He served as an intern for what was then called MPBN TV and also did volunteer work for MPBN Radio.