It may come too late for many strapped homeowners, but the combination of a mild winter and high levels of natural gas in storage have triggered decreases of 18 percent to 35 percent in the rates local gas companies will charge consumers the next three months.

Columbia Natural Gas, Equitable Gas and Dominion Peoples all filed quarterly rate change requests with the state Public Utility Commission yesterday, and all three will offer some relief to consumers still reeling from the one-two punch to their wallets in December, when bitter cold and record high natural gas prices sent home heating bills soaring.

Starting today and running through June, Equitable is dropping its rate to $11.73 per thousand cubic feet, or mcf, down 18 percent from $14.26. Dominion's new rate, $11.87 per mcf, is 21 percent less than the previous $15.12. And Columbia's gas cost recovery rate is being reduced to $8.37 per mcf from last quarter's $12.89, down 35 percent.

The impact of the new rates on customers' actual bills will vary. The average Equitable customer's monthly bill, for example, will now be $134, down 14 percent, said spokesman Dave Spigelmyer. The reduction is less than the decline in the gas rate because a consumer's bill also includes such things as gas delivery and storage.

Dominion estimates its average customer will see their bill reduced to $128, down 17 percent from $154, while Columbia projects that their average customer will see their monthly bill go to $104 -- 29 percent less than the previous $146.

If those reduced rates still sound somewhat high, that is because they are. State law requires the gas companies to charge consumers neither more nor less than what they themselves pay for gas, and the wholesale price for natural gas is still relatively high.

Historically, natural gas contracts have traded on the New York Mercantile Exchange for less than $6 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), which is roughly equivalent to a thousand cubic feet; in fact, they traded for as little as $2 per mmBtu in January of 2002.

The price spiked in early 2003, but it was Hurricane Ivan in the fall of 2004 that set the stage for an extended stretch of prices above $6, exacerbated by Hurricanes Wilma, Katrina and Rita last fall.

In December, the nearest monthly contract peaked at almost $16 per mmBtu.

While yesterday's closing price on the April contract, $7.23 per mmBtu, is less than half of that, it remains high by pre-Ivan standards.

Moreover, passing through the cost of gas to consumers is not as simple as it sounds because it requires tracking the price of gas not only as it is purchased but as it is stored and delivered. In the end, the pricing of natural gas becomes a guessing game -- albeit a highly complex and sophisticated one -- with gas companies adjusting prices every three months to compensate for the degree to which their guesses were off.

The manner in which prices are determined almost guarantees irony: the quarterly change that brings a decrease in rates comes just as the approach of warmer weather means that we use less gas anyway.

But some consumers may still have outstanding balances on their gas bills from early winter when prices were at their highest and the weather was at its coldest.

For them, the good news is that the Low Income Household Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP, has both extended its deadline for applications to April 14, and increased the amount of grant money available to help pay heating bills.

Interested consumers should call 1-866-857-7095, Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 4:45 p.m., for further information.