as that place froze over, the IESO's market kept on exporting

Happy March

I posted a serious (a.k.a. confusing) piece on Cold Air yesterday, Ontario is the sucker of first choice for off-price electricity and today I've run the routines on February data.

The Toronto Star advises February was Toronto's coldest month ever. I didn't read beyond the title, but I don't think they meant emotionally. "Ontario Demand" as defined by the IESO, was up about 2% from last year's also pretty cold February.

And yet, average hourly net exports were higher than ever - although the fewer days didn't allow the total net exports to reach January's high.

[caption id="attachment_353" align="alignnone" width="660"]JanExports graphic captured from http://data.luftonline.net/preliminary-monthly-report[/caption]

On Friday the IESO release preliminary Global Adjustment [GA] figures: the first estimate of the dollar total is $474 million, and the second estimate of the class B rate is $40.95. These estimates may or may not be reliable, but the rate will be used to charge some class B ratepayers much less than the $69.81 1st estimate GA charged other ratepayers. Smart is a relative term. Whoever thought of bumping up the billing cyle during this era of virtually nil interest rates my be considered smart with all those revenues coming in a couple of weeks earlier. To me, with interest rates near zero it matters little if they are future receivables or cash in hand. Billing on unexplained estimates doesn't seem smart, just irresponsible.
"Irresponsible"must be another relative term.

With the Hourly Ontario Energy Price (HOEP) averaging about $51.21/MWh, customers billed on the very poor first estimate of the global adjustment will be charged $120/MWh for the electricity commodity, while those billed on estimate number 2 will be at $92/MWh.

The generators I discussed in Ontario is the sucker of first choice for off-price electricity produced about 1.5 million MWh, of which my estimatation methodology shows 1.24 million were for export. The theory is Ontarians benefit when this happens, but I don't see any indication of that in the global adjustment estimates. Maybe the theory only applies to Ontarians participating directly in the IESO's "market."

Here's something interesting related to Ontario's electricity sector: the price of natural gas at the province's most relevant hub has risen well above the price at adjacent hubs. In the graph above you may have noted exports dropped off at the very end of the month. This could explain why.

[caption id="attachment_354" align="alignnone" width="599"]Feb15gas screen capture of http://www.psac.ca/business/firstenergy/[/caption]

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