Alberta’s weighted average Power Pool Price for May is currently $121.08/MWh. Relative to last week’s price of $124.26/MWh, this results in a minor decrease of $3.18/MWh or 2.6%. Hourly average demand in the province stayed flat week-over-week and had no bearing on price direction. Over the past week, we did see an increase in the number of off-peak hours settling below the $60/MWh mark. While the week prior only saw 6 periods during which off-peak prices settled below this mark, this past week had 21. Prices were elevated on the 21st ($144.12/MWh) and 24th ($142.51/MWh), due to minimal levels of wind generation, which averaged only 4.1% on these days. Intermitted outages at Keephills 3 and Battle River 5 further contributed to weekly volatility.
The weighted average Hourly Ontario Energy Price (HOEP) is settling at 3.4¢/kWh so far for the month of May, representing a 0.2¢/kWh or 6.0% decrease over last week’s settle. Despite this drop in price, natural gas-burning supply increased by 2.2% (943MW) over the course of this past week. Baseload generation, such as nuclear, decreased its output to an average of 7,553MW, a 305.5MW or 3.9% week-over-week decline. Hydro-based generation, on the other hand, climbed 0.7% to an average of 5,044MW. Wind output also increased (+1.7%; 1,236MW), whereas Solar and Biofuel decreased (-3.9%; -109MW, and -17.7%; -23MW, respectively). With the first Global Adjustment estimated at 6.0¢/kWh, May’s total market price is settling at 9.4¢/kWh as of today.
– Mark Ljuckanov, Energy Advisor / Ryan Cosgrove, Energy Data Analyst
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