Gas line services

If you smell gas right now

Read this part first. Everything else on the page can wait.

Leave the building. Take everyone and any pets with you.

Do not touch switches. Not lights, not the garage door, not a thermostat. A switch contact makes a spark. Leave lights as they are, on or off.

Do not use a phone inside. Make the call from outside, well away.

Do not look for it. No lighter, no match, no torch that switches on in the room.

Call the gas utility's emergency line from outside. They come out at no charge and they will shut off the supply. That call comes before ours. They secure the property, we repair it afterwards.

If you know where the meter shut-off is and can reach it safely from outside, a quarter turn of the valve perpendicular to the pipe closes it. Only if it is outside and only if it is safe.

Do not go back in until the utility says so.

Carbon monoxide is a different warning. It has no smell at all. Headaches, nausea, dizziness or drowsiness affecting several people in the house, easing when they leave. That is a call to emergency services, not a plumbing appointment. Every house with gas appliances should have CO alarms.

Finding and repairing leaks

What causes them. Corroded black iron pipe, particularly at threaded joints and where a line has been buried or damp. Joints that were never sealed properly. Physical damage. A shovel, a fence post, a pool contractor. Appliance connectors that have aged or been flexed once too often. Old valves that no longer seal on the stem.

How they are found. A pressure test isolates the system and shows whether it holds. It proves the presence of a leak but not its location. Combustible gas detectors sweep the run. Soap solution on joints confirms the exact point. On buried lines, the section gets isolated and tested in parts to narrow it down.

Repairs. A joint remade, a section of pipe replaced, a valve or an appliance connector changed. Where corrosion is widespread rather than local, common on old buried black iron, replacing the run is the honest recommendation, because chasing successive leaks along a corroded line is a losing game.

After the repair. The system is pressure tested again and held, appliances are relit and checked, and the work is inspected where the jurisdiction requires it.

Why the utility's visit is not the end of it. The gas company secures the property and will shut off the supply, but they do not repair customer-side piping. That is where a plumber comes in, and the supply generally stays off until the repair is made and tested.

New lines and additions

The common requests, and what each one involves.

A gas range in a kitchen that has never had one. A branch from the existing system to the kitchen, terminating in a valve behind the appliance. Route and access decide the price. A slab house with a long run from the meter is a different job from one where the line passes nearby in the attic.

Pool heater. High demand, often 200,000 to 400,000 BTU, and usually a long run to the equipment pad. This is the addition most likely to require upsizing the existing system, and sometimes a meter upgrade.

Standby generator. Similar picture: large intermittent load, and the sizing calculation has to assume it runs while everything else does.

Outdoor kitchen, grill or fire pit. Popular, straightforward in principle, and buried line to an exterior location has its own requirements for material, depth and protection.

Tankless water heater. Frequently the largest single appliance load in a house and the most common reason an existing line needs upsizing.

Fireplace logs, dryers, patio heaters. Smaller loads, same process.

The sizing calculation is the whole job. Total connected BTU, developed length of pipe, number of fittings, and the pressure available. Adding a large appliance to a system sized for what was there twenty years ago produces appliances that underperform in ways nobody connects to the gas line. A range that will not sear, a tankless that throws codes, a pool heater that never reaches temperature.

Materials, permits and testing

Black iron pipe is the traditional and still the most common material for interior runs. Durable, rigid, threaded joints, and every joint is a potential leak point, which is why fitting count matters.

CSST, corrugated stainless steel tubing, the flexible yellow or black jacketed product. Much faster to install through framing, far fewer joints. It must be tied into the electrical grounding system properly; that requirement exists because of lightning-related failures and it is not optional. Black-jacketed arc-resistant products are the current standard.

Polyethylene for buried exterior runs, with a riser transitioning to metal above ground. It does not corrode, which is exactly what a buried line needs.

Sediment traps at each appliance. A short capped drop that catches debris and moisture before it reaches an appliance valve. Required, and regularly missing on older installs.

Shut-off valves at every appliance, accessible without moving the appliance.

Permits. Gas work is permitted work in essentially every Texas jurisdiction, and rightly so. The inspection includes a pressure test held for a specified period at a specified pressure.

The test itself. The system is isolated, pressurised with air, and the gauge is watched. A system that holds steady passes. A gauge that drops means a leak somewhere, and the work is not finished until it holds.

Inspections, buying and selling

Buying a house with gas. A standard home inspection includes a visual look at gas appliances and piping. It does not include a pressure test. On an older property, or one with obvious additions, a proper gas test during the option period is worth the small cost.

Common findings. Missing sediment traps. Flexible appliance connectors run through walls or cabinets, which is not permitted. CSST with no electrical bonding. Capped lines from removed appliances that were never properly sealed. Corroded exterior pipe at ground level. Valves that will not close.

Re-establishing service. When a property has been vacant and the gas turned off, the utility usually requires a pressure test before restoring supply. That test frequently finds something, particularly on houses that have been empty a while.

After a remodel. Anywhere a wall came down or a kitchen moved, the gas system deserves a test. Lines get damaged, capped badly, or left live behind new drywall.

Old capped lines. An abandoned line to a heater that was removed in 1998 is still connected to the system. If the cap fails, it fails inside a wall. Worth finding and properly disconnecting.

Documentation. Permits and inspection records for gas work are worth keeping in a folder. They matter at resale and they matter to an insurer.