Electricity, Regulatory & Delivery Rates Headed UP

Its a Triple Whammy for Toronto Ratepayers 

As the Annual Feed in Tariff (FIT) Forum was wrapping up on April 4th, 2013 the Ontario Energy Board (OEB) was readying their April 5th press release to tell ratepayers what to expect in their electricity bills come May 1st. While the FIT Forum brought together the renewable energy developers to decide who gets what from ratepayers in the future, the OEB news was to tell Ontario ratepayers how much renewable energy will cost them for the next 6 months. The OEB announcement said rates would add $3.63 to the average ratepayers bill per month or 2.9% of the total monthly bill. On the surface that is about double the inflation rate however the increase only applies to the “electricity” portion of the bill and it is for 6 months. If they had been totally honest they would have reported the increase to the “electricity” line was effectively 11% and will extract (with the 13% HST added) almost $50. from that “average” ratepayer's wallet. Collectively that removes about $225 million annually from our pockets.

Buried in the increase is the $210 million the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) paid for those TransCanada gas turbines as noted on page 18 of the OEB's April 5, 2013 “Regulated Price Plan Report” which stated: “The cost of the turbine purchase that is part of the Oakville gas plant cancellation agreement is included in this forecast of global adjustment costs.”
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