Did electricity bills go up by 50% November 1st?

The short answer is “No”.

There several regulatory changes that did come into effect on November 1^st though – the net impact is an increase of about 1.8% per year to condominium electricity expenses.  This is consistent with the government’s announcements to have electricity go up only by the cost of inflation until 2021.

We are proud that we have made energy management and knowledge of energy regulations a core-competency at Crossbridge.  We recognized long ago that this is valuable to our clients.  Our Energy Manager provided us with a longer answer on the November 1^st changes:

Longer Answer:

• In 2017, the Liberal government introduced the Fair Hydro Plan, which generated a 25% reduction to residential electricity costs;
• In March, 2019, the Conservative government introduced legislation to unwind the Fair Hydro Plan.
• The following will be effective November 1, 2019:
  1. The rates that pay for electricity generation now reflect market rates – resulting in about a 50% increase in those rates;
  2. Electricity generation makes up about half of the bill – there were no changes to the other half of the bill, which pays for delivery and maintenance of the provincial and local distribution systems;
  3. The 8% HST rebate is eliminated;
  4. A new rebate (Ontario Energy Rebate) will appear at the bottom of the electricity bill – a 31.8% rebate.
  5. Condominiums will need to confirm their eligibility for the rebate to their utilities by February 2020 – Crossbridge will facilitate that communication for their clients.

• We’ve looked at various bill examples (smaller bills, larger bills, summer and winter bills), and can confirm the net impact of the changes average the stated 1.8% per year increase to condominium electricity expenses.  Increases will be specific to each building as they are dependent upon the amount of electricity used, the amount of electricity used at the different tier levels, and the maximum amount of electricity used at any one time during the billing period.