Level 2 power alert in AB last night.

[grassfarmer]

My December bill was $192.59 before GST for 651 Kw. Basic farmyard including house in REA territory. Have NG for heat in house. REA is very expensive because of redundant distribution costs. Actual power charge was 7.98 cents/KWh

Thank you, that's about what I suspected ajl based on what it was when I moved here - your total cost in AB is 29.5 cents versus 12.5c in MB reflective of the extra transmission costs.

Now it would be interesting to hear from the other provinces.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Besides that's only half the story - the energy charge - what about the transmission charges etc that really add to power bills in AB?

No, that is total monthly bill, including all transmission etc charges. I am surprised we are that close to cities in Quebec, Manitoba and BC, considering they are mainly hydro and virtually no "renewables", and we are mainly fossil fuels, with increasingly expensive renewables.

Going forward, I think it is safe to say costs will go up in AB, there is another solar farm going up east of me, and more wind farms coming online.

[Hamloc]

Thank you, that's about what I suspected ajl based on what it was when I moved here - your total cost in AB is 29.5 cents versus 12.5c in MB reflective of the extra transmission costs.

Now it would be interesting to hear from the other provinces.

Grassfarmer, central Alberta. October 1499 kwh. $290.80 so 19.84 a kwh all in
November 1366 kwh $296.61 so 21.71 a kwh all in
Not sure why October was cheaper per kilowatt didn't take the time to analyze the differences in the bill, I am on a fixed price for generation of 6.79 cents a kilowatt.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

All in price of 0.1746 per kWh in Dec

[grassfarmer]

Grassfarmer, central Alberta. October 1499 kwh. $290.80 so 19.84 a kwh all in
November 1366 kwh $296.61 so 21.71 a kwh all in
Not sure why October was cheaper per kilowatt didn't take the time to analyze the differences in the bill, I am on a fixed price for generation of 6.79 cents a kilowatt.

So quite a variation in AB prices it seems?
Here are some of the reasons why the prices are increasing Hamloc:

http://energyrates.ca/why-alberta-electricity-bills-are-getting-higher-and-what-you-can-do-about-it/ http://https://energyrates.ca/why-alberta-electricity-bills-are-getting-higher-and-what-you-can-do-about-it/

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Again, to show that some of us are not just here to bash renewables, some good news.

I've still been watching the AESO supply and demand report occasionally. It got really windy today at home, so I checked, and wind power has been consistently around 1500 out of 1781 potential MW production. 3 wind farms appear to be offline showing zeros, while the rest are at or near full capacity. Quite impressive, and consistent.

Over the past few weeks, wind seems to spend most days around 1000 to 1200 MW's, with regular and often precipitous drops down into the 100 to 300 range.

One good thing to come out of this is a new appreciation for living where we do. I can't stand wind, and it seems I live in the right place, when it is dead calm here, the Halkirk wind farm always seems to be putting out, and many others are way up. Only had a few brief windy hours here this winter, probably at a low risk for installing any turbines nearby.

[brs]

I was wondering why my saskpower bill seems to be going higher and higher, wanted to blame carbon tax totally but looked at a feb 2016 bill vs feb 2020 bill and basic charge is up 12.4% as did the cost of the electricity. Wish I could get a 3% increase every year. Carbon tax still pisses me off.

[shtferbrains]

You might be interested in this Wiki about Eldon Musk and Solar City;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SolarCity

[AlbertaFarmer5]

It seems that my praise of wind energy yesterday was premature. As of now, it is down to 66 MW. Only 5% of what it was 12 hours ago. But thanks to wind only producing a token portion of our electricity in AB, the lights are still on, only the prices went up. I see Germany just enjoyed widespread blackouts thanks to a big windstorms effect on wind power output.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

You might be interested in this Wiki about Eldon Musk and Solar City;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SolarCity

Did anyone else read the section about all of the frauds, litigation, corruption, bribery, making false claims about payback and falsifying numbers? Sounds like a good upstanding company...