New England is Importing Electricity from New York and Canada and Paying a Premium Price for it
"Natural gas-fired generation sets the clearing price across broad areas of ISO-NE, NYISO, and MISO in at least 75 percent of pricing intervals"
Current energy price component for electricity in New England is $103.18 per megawatt hour. In New York, it is $67.21 per megawatt hour.
If natural gas-fired plants are setting the clearing price for New England and in the neighboring state of New York, why the difference in prices?
New England is currently importing 1500 megawatts from New York.
New England is currently importing over 2300 megawatts from Canada.
Imports account for 30% of New England's' load.
Views: 62
Comment
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Comment by Willem Post on January 7, 2025 at 9:22am
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Ken,
All utilities have contracts with electricity producers for at least 90% of their electricity needs, the other 10% is bought at prevailing wholesale market prices.
ISO-NE has mark ups and charges fees
All that is the utility’s cost of acquired power
On top of that are political bullshit charges, such as taxes, fees, surcharges.
It would be good to get the cost structure line items of a utility
Also the cost structure of the rate base on which profit percent is calculated.
You would have to sit down with an insider accountant who is retired and willing to talk on the QT
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Comment by Dan McKay on January 6, 2025 at 10:26am
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Willem,
Vermont participates in the ISO-NE market and the power that GMP purchases from HQ has to enter its supply to the wholesale market. I am assuming GMP is buying the energy component only from HQ. ISO-NE reports that the 2023 average wholesale energy price was $37 per megawatt hour ( 3.7 cents per kilowatt hour) GMP loses 2.3 cents on every KWh, unless the power from HQ is supplied at peak hours only. Ratepayers make up the difference.
As a participant to ISO-NE operations, utilities are charged for ISO - NE transmission charges, Regional Network System charges, forward capacity market charges, line loss and congestion charges and other ancillary costs. This brings the wholesale costs to 8.2 cents per KWh. Add in state policy costs for renewable energy credits, solar benefits, distribution infrastructure costs, administrated costs, regulatory agency costs, utility profits and you get to retail price.
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Dan,
GMP, a utility in Vermont has a 20-y contract to buy 1.2 billion kWh/y from Hydro-Quebec at 6 c/kWh, wholesale.
Canada is eager to sell it, because it has excess hydro capacity.
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I agree, Willem, but when the Hub LMP in the ISO-NE market is higher than the LMP price for the NY-ISO and the Canadian province wholesale price, then the importing entities receive the higher ISO-NE LMP to their benefit.
On the other hand, importing a significant amount of electricity prevents the native LMPs from moving higher on the marginal clearinghouse price stack.
I'm assuming ISO-NE finds importing power that even if gives imports a profit boost is cheaper than the marginal price hike from more native supply which could only be natural gas plants, and they are in a position of fuel constraint.
All the more reason to increase pipeline capacity to increase natural gas supplies to generation plants.
And, with the Maine PUC having a very poor record with long term contracts, mainly because the laws that have been enacted only allow the PUC to approve the lowest bid contract, even when the bid is raising rates.
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Dan,
The STEADY electricity NE imports from Canada, under long term contract, is lower priced, c/kWh, than anything produced in NE.
We should have a lot more of it, but the wind and solar idiots are against it, because that would displace their highly subsidized, 3-4 times more expensive, variable electricity, that is weather-dependent and only occasionally available .
It is truly incompressible how technically naive politicians have drunk the Kool-Aid to vote, like robots, for wind and solar, because it screws their own constituents
Maine as Third World Country:
CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power
Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.
Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT
******** IF LINKS BELOW DON'T WORK, GOOGLE THEM*********
(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/
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Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law
Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future
"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."
https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/
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