A bill sitting on a kitchen counter in Portsmouth can therefore reflect events unfolding thousands of miles away.
The natural gas side of the story moved more gradually.
Portsmouth’s gas utility, Unitil, saw residential heating rates rise from roughly $1.48 per therm in 2024 to about $1.67 per therm by early 2026, an increase of around 12 percent. Beneath that relatively modest change the underlying commodity price of gas fluctuated far more sharply, yet the structure of regulated utility pricing spreads those swings across delivery charges and other components.
Those buffers soften sudden spikes before they reach the household bill.
Electricity markets rarely provide the same cushion.
The third force shaping the bill arrived from the weather.
The winter of 2025–2026 has been colder than most of the previous decade in New Hampshire. Heating-degree-day measurements—a standard way of tracking energy demand—ran higher than they had in roughly twelve winters by mid-February. Each stretch of cold pushed heating systems to run longer and harder.
Furnaces cycle more frequently. Electric heaters stay on longer. Heat pumps draw additional power to hold the indoor temperature steady.
Even stable energy prices would have produced larger bills.
When higher prices coincide with higher demand, the effect compounds. That is why the number on the bill—the one line no one used to notice—suddenly commands attention.
Inside the house the routine still feels simple. The thermostat rises a few degrees, the furnace switches on, and warm air moves through the rooms while the cold presses quietly against the walls.
Behind that moment sits a far larger machine: global fuel markets, regional power grids, municipal electricity contracts, regulatory pricing formulas, and a winter cold enough to make all of them visible at once.
The wind was still whipping across Peirce Island the next morning, bending the bare trees along the river path. The Piscataqua kept running with the tide, the current sliding past the docks too fast for ice to form.
Inside the century-old house near Strawbery Banke the furnace clicked on again.
The sound was the same as it had always been.
But the small line on the bill—the one nobody used to notice—is now where the larger forces of energy markets, geopolitics, and winter itself quietly arrive.