First Estimate of Ontario Electricity Global Adjustment: High

The first estimate for the global adjustment for Ontario electricity rates for December is out at the www.ieso.ca website. The value is 7.61 cents per KWh, down from the 8.47 cents per KWh in November, which set a record for the highest monthly global adjustment ever. The estimate is up massively compared to the final value of 4.06 cents per KWh in December of last year.

In general more demand lowers the global adjustment as the amount paid to high cost producer wind and solar producers is divided by more power consumed. December is usually a high demand month as more power is used for electric heating and also for lighting as December is the darkest month.

Less solar and wind production also leads to a lower global adjustment. Again, sunlight is at its lowest in December so solar producers won't have much electricity production. December is relatively windy so wind producers should have good production. Wind production can be high in the middle of the night when demand is relatively low compared to other parts of the day, and can cause problems if excess power has to be exported at low or negative costs to the US, however for December with the extra heating requirements at night that's less likely to be a problem. December thus far has also been relatively cold, so more electric heating has probably been used at night.