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Not mentioned in this article is that Hydro One also charges rural ontarians a “delivery fee”, which is about 2x the price of your usage. So you might pay 6 t

Not mentioned in this article is that Hydro One also charges rural ontarians a “delivery fee”, which is about 2x the price of your usage. So you might pay 6 to 14 cents per kWh, but your bill will be 3 times that amount. The delivery fee is also completely opaque: there’s no explanation to determine how it’s calculated, other than a brief text saying “a portion of this fee is fixed, and a portion depends on your usage”. But I haven’t been able to derive those values. If the formula for this delivery fee is something like ‘$xx + $yy*kWh’; then it appears these x and y values are not static.

xmaayy 5y ago
It could be that it is the formula you state "$xx + $yy*kWh", but you're getting variable amounts of power from different generation stations throughout a month that then all have a different x and y value
- lostmsu 5y ago
  That reminds me of money generating mechanic in Transport Tycoon Deluxe, where the further away goods production and consumption are, the higher is price for delivering. Even if there is a much closer source for the customer you just send the train from a factory on the other side of the map and charge for distance.
jacquesm 5y ago
I talked to someone in the power company at some point and they said it is a function of how far away you are to the nearest generating point. That could be a tale though, but it made some sense.
- xmaayy 5y ago
  Thats odd, because I'm facing the same 2-3x markup and I live about 2KM from an active hydro dam.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    Ugh. That's a ridiculous surcharge.
boringg 5y ago
So delivery is for wires, transmission, operations and safety (see wildfire maintenance as an example in CA). So whenever anyone new connects to the grid the cost will get defrayed through this mechanism. My theory is the more that people are becoming more effective at avoiding high generation fees the utilities will transfer the costs to the delivery fee increasing it over time to ensure they continue to get revenue. Generation is for the portion generated - which will likely go up with the surge in commodity prices this year - except since you are paying retail rates it will take longer you aren't immediately exposed to whole electricity prices and the costs of electricity are also political issues in Ontario to a small degree. Also in Ontario we sell power at a loss to Michigan (mainly because of overproduction of our Nuclear facilities). Its a real boondoggle.

xmaayy 5y ago

It could be that it is the formula you state "$xx + $yy*kWh", but you're getting variable amounts of power from different generation stations throughout a month that then all have a different x and y value

lostmsu 5y ago
That reminds me of money generating mechanic in Transport Tycoon Deluxe, where the further away goods production and consumption are, the higher is price for delivering. Even if there is a much closer source for the customer you just send the train from a factory on the other side of the map and charge for distance.

jacquesm 5y ago

I talked to someone in the power company at some point and they said it is a function of how far away you are to the nearest generating point. That could be a tale though, but it made some sense.

xmaayy 5y ago
Thats odd, because I'm facing the same 2-3x markup and I live about 2KM from an active hydro dam.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  Ugh. That's a ridiculous surcharge.

boringg 5y ago

So delivery is for wires, transmission, operations and safety (see wildfire maintenance as an example in CA). So whenever anyone new connects to the grid the cost will get defrayed through this mechanism. My theory is the more that people are becoming more effective at avoiding high generation fees the utilities will transfer the costs to the delivery fee increasing it over time to ensure they continue to get revenue. Generation is for the portion generated - which will likely go up with the surge in commodity prices this year - except since you are paying retail rates it will take longer you aren't immediately exposed to whole electricity prices and the costs of electricity are also political issues in Ontario to a small degree. Also in Ontario we sell power at a loss to Michigan (mainly because of overproduction of our Nuclear facilities). Its a real boondoggle.