Fortis, Nelson Hydro users take smaller hit, but still destined to get hit in wallet
By Nelson Daily Staff
By Suzy Hamilton, The Nelson Daily
Fortis and Nelson Hydro customers may think they are getting a break on 2014 rate increases compared to BC Hydro, after the Crown corporation announced a whopping 28 percent rate increase over the next five years to its customers.
But one electrical consumer advocate says Fortis customers are already paying ten percent more than BC Hydro customers.
And Nelson Hydro’s rates are presently two cents per KWh more than BC Hydro’s, if use is limited to 1,350 kWh during the billing period.
“And you can bet on it that Fortis will be asking for a bigger rate increase in April,” said Kaslo electrical consumer advocate Don Scarlett.
Fortis was recently approved for a 3.3 rate increase by the BC Utilities Commission.
Last week Minister of Energy and Mines MLA Bill Bennett announced that repairs, maintenance and new projects were going to cost BC Hydro electrical consumers nearly 30 percent more, compounded, as he delivered a nine percent jump beginning April 2014, followed by a six percent hike in 2015, and approximately three, four and five percent increases in the subsequent three years.
The Minister cited electrical demand , expected to increase some 40 percent in the next 20 years, and BC’s already low rates as reasons for the increase.
But Scarlett, who is in the micro-hydro business and is the former head of the Electrical Consumers Association, said BC Hydro’s accounting finally caught up with them and attributed the increase to two factors.
“One is the use of deferral accounting where Hydro took their costs and kicked them up the road.”
The other, he said, is an attempt to equalize the difference between what Hydro pays for power from independent power producers and what they can sell it for. He alleges there is at least a nine cent difference per kWh.
“All of this is coming home to roost,” he said. “This is an attempt to lose less money.”
Both Fortis and Nelson Hydro buy power from BC Hydro, which is expected to boost rates for both. Nelson buys from Fortis, which “dilutes” the increase, according to Alex Love, Nelson Hydro General Manager.
Both energy providers say they are in better shape than BC Hydro, however, because they have made their necessary upgrades and those costs are behind them.
And although Nelson Hydro does not have an inclining rate, such as Fortis, whereby the less you use costs you less, Love said the EcoSave program is very encouraging and that “conservation rates are on our radar.”
Scarlett, however, is not convinced. “I can say with pretty good confidence that although BC Hydro may get ahead of us, we will be paying as much as BC Hydro customers in the future.”
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