Nurzhan's new boiler houses should come with a published gas price

Nurzhan city council did a sensible thing on Tuesday. Two estates at the far end of the city's heating network, the 11th mikrorayon and the railway settlement behind the freight depot, have for years been warmed by pipes that lose much of their heat before it reaches a radiator. The city spent IS 1.7 million last winter patching those mains. Building two gas-fired boiler houses next to the blocks, at a cost of IS 10.4 million, should give about 6,900 households steadier heat and the city smaller repair bills.

The council papers, however, leave out one number: the price at which NurGaz will sell gas to the new plants. The deputy mayor told councillors that the gas will be bought under the city's existing supply contract and that tariffs on the two estates will not change this winter. That may well be true. But the contract has never been published, and a promise about one winter is not a tariff policy. The residents of these estates are mostly pensioners and railway families. They are entitled to know what their heat will cost in 2027 and after.

There is a good precedent for openness. After the failures of the 2012 winter, the city began replacing its main heating network in 2013 and reported on the work to the council in public. Residents could follow what was dug up, what it cost and what remained. The new boiler houses deserve the same treatment, all the more because the second stage, covering three more estates on the eastern edge of the city, will be costed in next year's budget.

The councillor who voted against, Dmitry Lazarenko, said the council was approving the kettle without knowing the price of the gas. One need not share his vote to accept the point. A council that approves capital spending without seeing the running costs is buying half a project.

The heating enterprise has promised a report on the first month of operation in mid-November. We ask that it include three things: the commissioning dates of both plants, the gas price paid per thousand cubic metres under the NurGaz contract, and a forecast of the tariff for the two estates for the next three heating seasons. If the contract's commercial terms must stay private, the price paid by the city need not. Publishing it would cost nothing, and it would let the people of the 11th mikrorayon judge the project by their radiators and their bills.