If Mother Nature played to form overnight, Lawrence residents woke up early today to something they haven’t seen all fall: a glaze of frost across their lawns.

That’s a far cry from last week when temperatures flirted with the 90-degree mark. But it is a sign that winter is around the corner.

Just how harsh a winter it will be remains to be seen; climatologists say it is still too early to know what is in store. The harshest season, they note, doesn’t begin until Dec. 22.

“We’ve seen a really wide range of temperatures,” said Mary Knapp, Kansas state climatologist. “There really aren’t any strong signals anywhere about what to expect.”

The National Weather Service remains vague in its long-term forecast, saying only that there is a 50 percent chance the area will have a warmer-than-normal winter.

Lawrence experienced a wide swing in temperatures this past winter, 6News meteorologist Ross Janssen said. The warmest winter high last year was 77 degrees, and the coldest high was 9 degrees. The coldest low temperature was minus 7.

The average high temperature for the Lawrence-Topeka area in January is 37.2 degrees with the average low being 17.2 degrees, according to the National Weather Service in Topeka.

“Temperatures look like they will stay close to normal with above-normal precipitation possible,” Janssen predicted.

Heating cost concerns

If it is a warm winter, those who heat their homes with natural gas may get a break, courtesy of the weather. Aquila, the natural gas utility that serves Lawrence, is projecting heating bills could increase as much as 12 percent this winter. Supplies also will be a factor.

One reason gas costs are increasing is growing competition for supplies from electrical power companies, said Larissa Long, community relations representative for Aquila in Lawrence.

Power companies are choosing to use more natural gas instead of coal to produce electricity. They have needed more natural gas because of the high demand for electricity for cooling systems in recent hot summers.

For those who heat their homes with electricity, officials with Westar Energy said they did not expect other than normal winter heating bills.

Though the cost of natural gas could affect the price of propane gas, there is no supply problem, said Justin Holstin, executive vice president of Petroleum Marketers of Kansas.

“We’re not expecting to see a massive increase now,” Holstin said of propane prices, which currently range from 90 cents to $1.10 per gallon in Kansas.

Let it snow

Forecasters also are unsure what to expect as far as this winter’s snowfall.

“Depending on what happens with the jet stream during the next month or so, that may give a good indication of what happens during the upcoming winter,” Janssen said. “More moisture may fall during the early part of 2004.”

Total snowfall from December 2002 through February 2003 was 8.5 inches. Two winters ago, only 9.5 inches fell.

For the year, Lawrence is 7 inches below average in its moisture total. The city normally receives 27.22 inches of precipitation.

Drought conditions vary across Kansas. Lawrence is on the border between moderate and severe drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor map. Northwestern Kansas remains in an extreme drought, while southeast Kansas is not in a drought.

No matter how much snow falls in Lawrence, city crews have plenty of salt and sand available to spread on the streets. About 2,500 tons of a salt-and-sand mix were left over from last year’s supplies, street maintenance manager Tom Orzulak said. An additional 2,000 tons of sand have been ordered.

When heavy snow falls, Orzulak will call on a crew of nearly 40 people who can be divided into two shifts to work around the clock, if necessary.