Hydro One Update – Spring, 2017
Hydro rates remain a controversial subject across all of Ontario these days as the Government tries to soften the impact of the significant increases being experienced by Ontario consumers.
In the midst of these issues there remain two issues that have additional impacts on the Balsam Lake community, namely;
The first initiative is underway across the province and is being phased in for Hydro One customers beginning January 2016 over an 8 year period. The intent here is to minimize any customers increase from this change to less than 10%/year. The end result is that Hydro One’s distribution charges will be at flat rate and not a function of your monthly usage.
The second initiative was addressed by Hydro One in its submission to the OEB in December this past year. In that submission, Hydro One has proposed a plan to eliminate Seasonal class over a period of some 8 years to mitigate the dramatic impact on current seasonal customers who would move to the R2 rate class. In addition during that period Hydro One would apply transition credits to these customers by collecting a small levy from all existing Hydro one customers each month, in the order of $2.00/month. This issue is very controversial as many Seasonal customers in zone R1 (Balsam Lake community) will see their costs decrease while most Seasonal customers in zone R2 will see dramatic increases in their electricity costs. Currently those Seasonal customers in R2 are being subsidized by the Seasonal customers in R1.
The Balsam Lake Coalition (BLC) is continuing to advocate for the elimination of Seasonal class and was a major contributor in the decision to move delivery charges to flat rate. The Balsam Lake Association continues their support for the efforts of BLC.
