The area gas boards were created under the provisions of the

Gas Act 1948 The Gas Act 1948 ( 11 & 12 Geo. 6. c. 67) was an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which nationalised, or bought into state control, the gas making and supply industry in Great Britain. It established 12 area gas boards to own and op ...

enacted by

Clement Attlee Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee (3 January 18838 October 1967) was a British statesman who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1945 to 1951 and Leader of the Labour Party (UK), Leader of the Labour Party from 1935 to 1955. At ...

post-war Labour government Clement Attlee was invited by King George VI to form the first Attlee ministry in the United Kingdom on 26 July 1945, succeeding Winston Churchill as prime minister of the United Kingdom. The Labour Party had won a landslide victory at the 19 ...

. The Act nationalised the British gas industry and also created the Gas Council.

History

From the early 19th century the gas supply industry in the United Kingdom was mainly operated by local authorities and private companies. A flammable gas (known as "town gas" or "

coal gas Coal gas is a flammable gaseous fuel made from coal and supplied to the user via a piped distribution system. It is produced when coal is heated strongly in the absence of air. Town gas is a more general term referring to manufactured gaseous ...

") was piped to commercial, domestic and industrial customers for use as a fuel and for lighting. It was marketed to consumers by such means as the National Gas Congress and Exhibition in 1913. The gas used in the 19th and early 20th centuries was

but in the period 1967–77 coal gas supplies were replaced by

natural gas Natural gas (also fossil gas, methane gas, and gas) is a naturally occurring compound of gaseous hydrocarbons, primarily methane (95%), small amounts of higher alkanes, and traces of carbon dioxide and nitrogen, hydrogen sulfide and helium ...

, first discovered in the UK North Sea in 1965.

Nationalisation

In 1948

's Labour government reshaped the gas industry, enacting the Gas Act 1948. The act

nationalise Nationalization (nationalisation in British English) is the process of transforming privately owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization contrasts with priv ...

d the UK gas industry and 1,064 privately owned and municipal gas companies were merged into twelve area gas boards each a separate body with its own management structure. Under the Gas Act 1948 the area boards were charged with three duties: # To develop and maintain an efficient, co-ordinated and economical system of gas supply for their areas and to satisfy, so far as it is economic to do so, all reasonable demands for gas within their area. # To develop and maintain the efficient, co-ordinated and economical production of coke, other than metallurgical coke. # To develop and maintain efficient methods of recovering by-products obtained in the process of manufacturing gas.

Management board

The management board for each area board typically comprised: * Chairman * Deputy chairman * Chief engineer * Controller of research * Controller of services * Commercial manager * Public relations officer * Secretary * Chief accountant * Staff controller The chairman of each area board was a member of the Gas Council. Each area board was divided into geographical groups or divisions which were often further divided into smaller districts. These boards simply became known as the "gas board", a term people still use when referring to

British Gas British Gas (trading as Scottish Gas in Scotland) is an energy and home services provider in the United Kingdom. It is the trading name of British Gas Services Limited and British Gas New Heating Limited, both subsidiaries of Centrica. Serving ...

, the company that replaced the boards when the Gas Act 1972 was passed. The area boards became regions of the British Gas Corporation.

Area gas boards

References

{{reflist Natural gas industry in the United Kingdom