Energy

Families Who Heat With Oil Face The Steepest Winter Bill Increase Of Any Fuel As Federal Aid Stays Flat

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Families who heat with oil face the steepest winter bill increase of any fuel, while federal heating aid stays flat.

The Energy Information Administration (EIA) projected Tuesday that spending by households that heat mainly with oil will rise 21 percent this winter, the largest increase of any heating fuel, as low stocks of diesel and heating oil keep prices high, according to its Winter Fuels Outlook.

The National Energy Assistance Directors Association (NEADA) — which represents state heating aid administrators — expects the hit to be even larger. The average household using heating oil could spend about $2,625 this winter, up roughly $875 from about $1,750 last winter, NEADA Executive Director Mark Wolfe told the Daily Caller News Foundation. That is higher than the nearly $2,300 NEADA had projected in September.

“EIA may turn out to be right, but we are less optimistic that heating-oil prices will fall as quickly as they are projecting,” Wolfe said. “Distillate inventories remain low, the war continues to put pressure on global oil and diesel markets, and there is considerable uncertainty about winter temperatures.”

The largest concentrations of oil-heated homes outside New England are in New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, according to Wolfe.

“Heating oil is often thought of as primarily a New England issue, but there are still a very large number of oil-heated homes in the Mid-Atlantic states,” he said.

Heating oil averaged $4.90 a gallon across New York in June, up from $3.65 a year earlier, according to the state energy authority’s price survey. About 4 percent of U.S. households use heating oil, and roughly three-quarters of it is burned in the Northeast, Wolfe told the DCNF in September. Heating oil has been hit by the same limited refining capacity driving up diesel, NHPR reported.

Federal heating aid has not kept pace. Funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) was about $4.1 billion in fiscal 2026, and states are operating at roughly last year’s level under current funding, Wolfe said. If overall winter heating costs rise about 8 percent and states keep average benefits the same, the program could help the equivalent of roughly 450,000 to 500,000 fewer households nationwide, he estimated. He said states will make different choices.

“An additional $875 heating bill can easily exceed an entire LIHEAP benefit in some states,” Wolfe said. “That means even families who receive assistance can still be left with a very substantial bill.”

“Low-income families were already struggling with record utility arrearages and increasing shut-offs before this winter,” Wolfe said. “Higher winter bills are being layered on top of an affordability problem that was already severe.”

Heating oil in Maine reached a record average of $6.02 a gallon in late September, according to NHPR. In Vermont, where more households heat with oil than with any other fuel, the price rose from under $3.50 a gallon in September 2025 to more than $5 by May, according to state data cited by VTDigger.

In New Hampshire, heating assistance providers told Pappas at a roundtable Monday in Concord that they are seeing more first-time applicants and more residents asking about overdue balances than at this point last year, the New Hampshire Bulletin reported. The state’s maximum benefit is $2,500, while the average recipient gets about $1,200, the outlet reported.

“If we didn’t get heat assistance, for instance, we wouldn’t make it at all,” Per Garp, a retired farmer from Loudon, said at the roundtable, according to the Bulletin.

Democratic New Hampshire Rep. Chris Pappas has introduced legislation to increase LIHEAP funding. Pappas faces Republican nominee John E. Sununu, a former U.S. senator, in a competitive November race for the seat held by retiring Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen.