Union Gas Limited is a major Canadian natural gas storage, transmission and distribution company based in Ontario with over 100 years of experience and service to customers. The distribution business serves 1.4 million residential, commercial and industrial customers in more than 400 communities across northern, southwestern and eastern Ontario. Union Gas' growing storage and transmission business offers premium storage and transportation services to customers at the Dawn Hub, the largest underground storage facility in Canada and one of the largest in North America. It offers customers an important link in the movement of natural gas from Western Canadian and U.S. supply basins to markets in central Canada and the northeast U.S. Union Gas, one of Canada's Top 100 Employers for 2016, is a Spectra Energy (NYSE: SE) company with assets of $7.2 billion and approximately 2,300 employees.

Union Gas was founded as Union Natural Gas Company of Canada Limited on December 19, 1911 through the amalgamation of three southern Ontario local gas distribution companies: Volcanic Oil and Gas Company, United fuel Supply and Ridgetown Fuel Supply. Originally headquartered in Niagara Falls, Union Gas moved its head office to Chatham in 1918 to be closer to the centre of Ontario gas production.

During the 1920s, Union expanded its operations into Sarnia, Wallaceburg and Windsor. From 1930 to 1960, Union continued to expand its operations throughout southwestern Ontario, adding the cities of London, Stratford, Waterloo, Guelph and Brantford.

During this period, a number of strategic facilities expansions took place. In 1942, storage and compression facilities were developed in Dawn Township, south of Sarnia, utilizing depleted underground gas pools. At the same time, pipeline connections to the U.S. Panhandle Eastern Pipeline were built at Windsor for the importation of U.S. gas.

In 1958 a new, 142-mile long, 26-inch diameter transmission pipeline was constructed from the Dawn Compressor station to Oakville, in order to connect Union's system with the TransCanada Pipeline which brought Western Canadian gas to Ontario that year. In 1959 Union Gas extended its system north to Owen Sound. In 1973 an amalgamation with United Gas Limited of Hamilton extended Union's service into that community.

In April, 1985, a significant milestone in Union Gas's history occurs when the 500-thousandth customer is added.

Over the next 30 years, Union continued to enjoy strong growth and distribution, transmission and storage facilities expanded greatly to meet growing customer demand. Assets increased ten-fold from $400 million in 1975 to over $7.2 billion in 2016. A number of key events occurred during this time:

• In 1985, Union Gas became the wholly owned subsidiary of a newly created parent company, Union Enterprises Ltd. A significant milestone in Union Gas's history occurs when the 500-thousandth customer is added.
• In 1986, Unicorp Canada Corporation became the controlling shareholder of Union's parent.
• In 1992 Unicorp sold Union Gas to Westcoast Energy Inc. of Vancouver B.C.
• In 1994 Union Gas entered into a shared services operating arrangement with sister company and fellow Westcoast subsidiary, Centra Gas Ontario, a natural gas distribution utility serving about 225,000 customers along the TransCanada Pipeline, across northern and eastern Ontario.
• On January 1, 1998, Union Gas and Centra Gas Ontario were amalgamated, under the name of Union Gas Limited, a company now serving over a million customers from the Manitoba border to the Quebec border, and the industrial heartland of Southwestern Ontario from Windsor to just west of Toronto. Today, with about 2,200 employees working in communities across Ontario, Union Gas is a major employer in the province.
• On January 1, 1999, Union Gas transferred its retail merchandise programs, including equipment sales, rentals, financing and appliance service programs, to an unregulated energy services affiliate, Union Energy. Union Gas continued to provide safe, reliable and economical delivery of natural gas to customers. In an increasingly competitive energy marketplace, the company has concentrated its efforts on providing high-value energy delivery services to meet the changing needs of customers, including energy retail marketers.
• With Duke Energy's March 2002 purchase of Westcoast Energy, Union Gas became a Duke Energy company. Duke Energy is a diversified energy company with a portfolio of natural gas and electric businesses, both regulated and unregulated, and an affiliated real estate company headquartered in Charlotte, N.C..
• On January 1, 2007, Duke Energy spun-off its natural gas business including Union Gas, into a new publicly traded company named Spectra Energy Corp.

• Union Gas Utility Representative

  Spectra Energy Corp (NYSE: SE), a FORTUNE 500 company, is one of North America's premier natural gas infrastructure companies serving three key links in the natural gas value chain: gathering and processing, transmission and storage, and distribution. For nearly a century, Spectra Energy and its predecessor companies have developed critically important pipelines and related infrastructure connecting natural gas supply sources to premium markets. Based in Houston, Texas, the company operates in the United States and Canada approximately 21,000 miles of transmission pipeline, more than 300 billion cubic feet of storage, as well as natural gas gathering and processing, natural gas liquids operations and local distribution assets. The company also has a 50 percent ownership in DCP Midstream, one of the largest natural gas gatherers and processors in the United States. Spectra Energy is a member of both the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index and the U.S. S&P 500 Carbon Disclosure Project's Leadership Index.

Environment, Health and Safety

Our Environment, Health and Safety Department (EHS) makes every effort to ensure the safety of our customers, our employees and our environment. These efforts are the responsibility of each employee in the way that they work everyday.

Union Gas follows an EHS Management System to ensure that EHS impacts and hazards are managed in an appropriate manner, to continuously improve our EHS performance, to ensure the Company complies with all applicable regulations and to maintain consistency with Spectra Energy, our parent company.

Our EHS Management System provides:

• A guideline for management to address EHS issues;

• A way to measure EHS performance;

• A process for reporting to senior management; and

• A framework for making EHS a part of everyday business.

Training is an important component of Union Gas's EHS Management System program. All employees receive core EHS training.  Union Gas employees whose activities may have a significant impact on the environment, health or safety must receive appropriate training. They must be aware of any significant impacts their activities may have on the environment, health and safety, and how to avoid causing them, and why avoiding them is beneficial.

It is a goal of Union Gas's EHS Management System to keep track of our Environment, Health and Safety performance, and strive for continuous improvement.  The Spectra Energy Safety Vision, details our commitment to safety.

Union Gas at a Glance

A quick reference guide of company highlights. Looking for who we serve, where we are and what we do? You'll find the short answers here.

History

Over 100 years of experience and service to customers in Ontario.

Head Office

50 Keil Drive North, Chatham, Ontario, N7M 5M1. Phone: (519) 352-3100 or (800)-265-5230

Number of Customers

• 1.4 million

Number of Employees

• 2,300

Financial Results

• Revenue - $2 billion
• Net Income - $188 million
• Total Assets - $7.2 billion

Pipelines

• Distribution main pipelines - 37,895 km (23,548 miles)
• Distribution service pipelines - 26,913 km (16,724 miles)
• Transmission pipelines - 4,811 km (2,988 miles)

Business Activities

• Safe and reliable distribution of natural gas to homes, businesses and industry
• Innovative storage and transmission services for other utilities and companies

Distribution of Natural Gas

Union Gas' distribution business serves about 1.4 million residential, commercial and industrial customers in more than 400 communities across northern, southwestern and eastern Ontario. Our distribution service area extends throughout northern Ontario from the Manitoba border to the North Bay/Muskoka area, through southwestern Ontario from Windsor to just west of Toronto, and across eastern Ontario from Port Hope to Cornwall.