{"id":8767,"date":"2016-11-25T11:44:36","date_gmt":"2016-11-25T18:44:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/?p=8767"},"modified":"2016-11-25T11:44:36","modified_gmt":"2016-11-25T18:44:36","slug":"ontarios-smart-meters-failing-to-cut-electricity-demand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/?p=8767","title":{"rendered":"Ontario&#8217;s smart meters failing to cut electricity demand"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><strong>\u00a0<span style=\"font-size: 1.17em; line-height: 1.5em;\">Time-of-use pricing was supposed to shift hydro customers&#8217; use away from peak periods<\/span><\/strong><\/div>\n<p>By\u00a0Mike Crawley,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/news\/cbc-news-online-news-staff-list-1.1294364\">CBC News<\/a>\u00a0Posted: Nov 24, 2016 10:57 AM ET\u00a0Last Updated: Nov 24, 2016 10:57 AM ET<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/hydro-protest.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-8768\" alt=\"hydro-protest\" src=\"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/hydro-protest.jpg\" width=\"620\" height=\"349\" srcset=\"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/hydro-protest.jpg 620w, https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/hydro-protest-300x168.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 620px) 100vw, 620px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Demonstrators unhappy with the price of electricity protest outside the Ontario Legislature on Wednesday. (Mike Crawley\/CBC)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Smart meters \u2014 the $2-billion project to switch millions of Ontario households and small businesses to a differential hydro pricing scheme \u2014 are failing to accomplish the chief objective of curtailing electricity demand at peak periods, according to growing research.<\/p>\n<p>The latest figures from the province&#8217;s\u00a0energy agencies indicate\u00a0residential consumers are burning nearly as much hydro at peak periods as they were before smart meters were rolled out.<\/p>\n<p>As well,\u00a0cost of electricity at peak periods has soared 82\u00a0per cent since 2010, when smart meters and &#8220;time of use&#8221; pricing started becoming the norm for Ontario households.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/news\/canada\/toronto\/ontario-hydro-bills-1.3860314\">Why hydro prices are so high in Ontario<\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/1.3859003\">&#8216;My mistake&#8217;: Kathleen Wynne\u00a0takes blame for unaffordable hydro bills<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>With many people in Ontario saying\u00a0peak pricing is one of the reasons electricity bills are rising, the government of Kathleen Wynne is being forced to re-examine\u00a0time-of-use pricing to meet its pledge of making\u00a0hydro more affordable.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Everything is on the table,&#8221;\u00a0Energy Minister Glenn\u00a0Thibeault\u00a0answered when I asked him at Queen&#8217;s\u00a0Park\u00a0on Wednesday about changing the time-of-use program.<\/p>\n<p>\u200b&#8221;There are solutions that are being proposed out there and it&#8217;s my job &#8230; to find ways to continue to have downward pressure on rates,&#8221; Thibeault said.\u00a0&#8220;It&#8217;s a difficult process to look at, but I know it&#8217;s one that I&#8217;m happy to tackle.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><em>A series of reports examining Ontario&#8217;s electricity system indicate the smart meter project and time-of-use pricing are neither significantly reducing peak hydro demand nor persuading consumers to shift their usage to off-peak periods. (Canadian Press)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The province&#8217;s rationale behind smart meters and peak-period pricing was &#8220;to give consumers incentives and opportunities to reduce their electricity bills by shifting their time of electricity use.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But consumers don&#8217;t appear to be biting.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The current time-of-use pricing structure has not provided sufficient incentives for consumers to shift and\/or reduce use,&#8221; concludes a recent review conducted\u00a0by the\u00a0Brattle\u00a0Group\u00a0consulting\u00a0firm\u00a0for the Independent Electricity System Operator.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s the latest report indicating the smart metering initiative is failing to have a significant impact on demand. In addition:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The Environmental\u00a0Commissioner of Ontario&#8217;s 2015-16 Energy Conservation Progress Report found\u00a0&#8220;a 0.7 per cent reduction in peak demand among residential customers&#8221;\u00a0attributed\u00a0to time-of-use\u00a0pricing over a four-year period. The province had predicted\u00a0the cut in demand would be six times greater than that.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div>\n<p><em>Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk found that time-of-use pricing was having only a &#8216;minor impact&#8217; on peak electricity demand. (Frank Gunn\/Canadian Press)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A 2014 report for the Ontario Energy Board\u00a0by the\u00a0consulting\u00a0firm\u00a0BEworks concludes that time-of-use pricing has had &#8220;limited success&#8221; in shifting consumption away from peak periods. &#8220;There has been little to no change to consumer behaviour in response to dynamic pricing and smart meter initiatives,&#8221; the report said. &#8220;Ontario&#8217;s [time-of-use]\u00a0pricing model is not adequately achieving its conservation and demand management goals.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The auditor general&#8217;s 2014 annual report found that time of use pricing had only a &#8220;minor impact&#8221; on peak demand, and that 65 per cent of residential customers failed to reduce their consumption during peak periods.\u00a0&#8220;The difference between the On-Peak and Off-Peak rates has not been significant enough to encourage a change in consumption patterns,&#8221; wrote the auditor.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>An impact analysis by Navigant\u00a0Consulting in 2013 found that households on smart meters reduced their consumption in peak periods by an average of just 3.3 per cent.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div>\n<p><em>Sarah Warry-Poljanski, who leads the group Hamiltonians Against High Hydro, was among those at Wednesday&#8217;s protest at Queen&#8217;s Park. (Mike Crawley\/CBC)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&#8220;Really we haven&#8217;t learned anything in 10 years,&#8221; said energy policy blogger Scott Luft\u00a0in an interview on Wednesday. He describes Ontario&#8217;s time-of-use pricing strategy as a failure at reducing peak demand and &#8220;a failure in terms of costing consumers money.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He argues that time-of-use pricing has a &#8220;regressive&#8221; aspect, as it charges people who use little electricity the same price as people who own large homes and burn lots. Previously, hydro bills were structured to charge significantly less to people who used less than 600 kWh a month (about one-third of all residential customers).<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;When they switched to time of use it really was a price hike for everyone who used less than 600 kWh a month,&#8221; said Luft. &#8220;What it really did is it dropped the price for heavy users [of electricity]\u00a0and raised the price for low users.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><em>Premier Kathleen Wynne called it &#8216;unacceptable&#8217; that people have to choose between paying the electricity bill and buying food. She has ordered her energy minister to find ways to make hydro more affordable. (Jonathan Hayward\/Canadian Press)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Dozens of those electricity users rallied in the cold outside the Ontario Legislature on Wednesday to protest their high hydro bills. Some blamed privatization for the rising costs, while others blamed the green energy program.<\/p>\n<p>Time-of-use pricing got its share of criticism, too.<\/p>\n<p>Sarah\u00a0Warry-Poljanski,\u00a0leader\u00a0of Hamiltonians\u00a0Against High\u00a0Hydro, said\u00a0air conditioning on summer afternoons and electric heating on winter mornings are being priced as if they&#8217;re &#8220;luxury&#8221;\u00a0goods.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If you&#8217;re home, or you&#8217;re home with small children, or you&#8217;re a senior, you&#8217;re being hammered, you can&#8217;t afford it anymore, &#8221; Warry-Poljanski said\u00a0in an interview.<\/p>\n<p>The provincial Liberals, meanwhile, wonder if they can afford to have so many people angry about their hydro bills.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/news\/canada\/toronto\/smart-meters-hydro-bills-ontario-time-of-use-pricing-1.3862462\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">http:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/news\/canada\/toronto\/smart-meters-hydro-bills-ontario-time-of-use-pricing-1.3862462<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0Time-of-use pricing was supposed to shift hydro customers&#8217; use away from peak periods By\u00a0Mike Crawley,\u00a0CBC News\u00a0Posted: Nov 24, 2016 10:57 AM ET\u00a0Last Updated: Nov 24, 2016 10:57 AM ET Demonstrators unhappy with the price of electricity protest outside the Ontario Legislature on Wednesday. (Mike Crawley\/CBC) &nbsp; Smart meters \u2014 the $2-billion project to switch millions [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[103,122,19,18,371],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-canada","category-cost-increase","category-ontario","category-smart-meter","category-toronto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8767"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8767\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8769,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8767\/revisions\/8769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}