Cold snap reveals mismanagement of Alberta power grid
Calgary – Official Opposition Energy Critic Kent Hehr says this week’s bone-freezing temperatures will chill Albertans even further when they see their power bills spike a couple of months from now – and those higher bills come courtesy of the PCs and their mismanagement of the power grid.
This week, Alberta experienced record-low temperatures that, combined with unplanned outages at three power plants, caused the kilowatt/hour price to spike to its maximum level, over 99 cents. While Albertans won’t see a price jump right away – it takes time for such spikes to appear on a monthly bill – we will pay for the lack of supply eventually, Hehr says.
“Here’s the problem. Way back in 1999, the PCs promised that deregulation would open up the power grid to the free market and everyone’s power bills would drop. Well, it hasn’t turned out that way. Albertans now pay among the highest power prices in the nation, because the government hasn’t managed the grid properly or properly incentivized utility companies to build more baseline generation. The result: more money out of your pocket to make big power companies rich.”
The Official Opposition is committed to the principle that electricity is an essential service that must be affordable for every Albertan.
“We need more baseline generation built close to cities to ensure that power is as cheap and plentiful as possible, while avoiding costly new transmission lines to move electricity between Edmonton and Calgary,” Hehr says. “At the same time, we should ensure that as much new generation as possible comes from clean alternatives such as gas-fired plants, wind and hydro while also examining long-term solutions to replace coal-burning generation.”
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Earl J. Woods, Senior Communications Advisor
(780) 904-5430
Denis Lapointe, SALCO Director
(403) 860-4330