Alberta’s weighted average Power Pool price for the month of August settled at $85.54/MWh. Relative to last week’s price of $88.26/MWh, this represents a decrease of $2.72/MWh or 3.1%. Minimal pricing volatility over the past week helped lower August’s settle, with prices averaging $73.86/MWh. Prices spiked only one day last week, on the 30th, when daily pricing peaked at $152.37/MWh; had prices not spiked this high, the weekly price would have settled to under $60/MWh. Temperatures in the past week helped suppress volatility, as they only reached above 25°C once, coinciding with rain and cloud coverage during other days in the week. With mild temperatures, average hourly demand decreased mildly in turn, dropping from 9,347MW to 9,289MW – a difference of 58MW or 0.1%. Minimal generator activity over the past week further decreased market volatility, with generator outages occurring intermittently, with the most extended being Sundance 6 occurring on the 30th between 3am and 11pm MST.
The weighted average Hourly Ontario Energy Price (HOEP) settled at 4.3¢/kWh for the month of August, an increase of 0.2¢/kWh or 5% compared to last week’s settle. Although demand and supply both increased 2% compared to average August levels, this uptick in price was caused by a shift in the generation mix. Nuclear decreased its baseload by 4% (10,126MW) and, to compensate for this drop, natural gas increased its supply by 25% (3,224MW). Hydro and solar decreased their supply slightly (-8%, 3,601MW; -9%, 106MW), while wind and biofuel made strong injections (+30%, 705MW; +82%, 46MW). With the first Global Adjustment estimated at 8.1¢/kWh and the first estimate recovery rate set at 0.6¢/kWh, August’s total market price is 13.0¢/kWh.
– Mark Ljuckanov, Energy Advisor / Sarah Jakov, Energy Data Analyst
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