The New Corporate Logo for Alberta Power Companies - "Plunder"
And make no mistake it is a generous gift.
“In Alberta, the big standout price increase was for electricity, which cost 63.6 per cent more in January than it did a year ago,” he said.
Go figure. When the people who generate the power also control the supply do you think that they will manipulate the system of their benefit? Of course they will.
“In the wake of revelations that TransAlta Corp. manipulated the power market to increase profits, a report to the Alberta monitor warns there’s a risk that participants may be working together to the same end.
The study prepared by consultancy Charles River Associates for the Alberta Market Surveillance Administrator, the enforcement arm of a system set up when Alberta deregulated its power market in 1995, looks into whether the level of data released makes it possible for participants to work in concert — but not whether they actually have.
It concludes that the Alberta market “may be susceptible to co-ordinated behaviour” because it has high supplier concentration, barriers to entry, repeated and frequent interaction by players and relatively constant levels of demand.
So the situation is ripe for plunder of Alberta’s citizens and plunder is exactly what TransAlta did.
“In a negotiated settlement with the MSA, TransAlta agreed to pay $370,000 and admit it purposely blocked the import of cheaper hydroelectric power from British Columbia over 31 hours in November 2010, creating an artificial shortage of electricity and higher prices.
The settlement, which takes away excess profits of $245,000 and includes a $125,000 fine, will be the subject of an Alberta Utilities Commission public hearing in January.”
This is why we need regulation and strong government oversight because this is just one reported incident that happened to be egregious enough to be caught. Companies do not work for the pubic or the public good, they work to accrue the largest benefit of their shareholders and as noted above if swindling the people of alberta is good for the bottom line, so be it. Yet the lovely PC government goads us with whip and and the bludgeon to buy into this corrupt system.
“Alberta’s regulated rate option — the rate consumers pay if they haven’t signed contracts with electricity retailers — was designed by the provincial government to encourage retail consumers to purchase contracts, which would theoretically attract more competition.
In July 2010, the governing Conservatives ended long-term hedging of electricity prices and collapsed the protective umbrella that had previously shielded residential, farm and small commercial consumers from wild price spikes.”
This simple is collusion with the power companies by the PC party. This is not in the best interests of people of Alberta. Far from it. But let me assure you gentle readers, the brain-dead zombie sheeple of Alberta will continue to vote PC in the next election. Why? Your guess is as good as mine.
bleatmop
Mystro
The Arbourist
Dead Wild Roses 
9 comments
February 20, 2012 at 2:30 pm
cyberclark
This story is the tip of the iceberg! The Conservatives separated generation from Transmission with the sale of PPAs (Power Purchase Agreements)
The higher profit agreements were picked up right away. Many of these purchases were resold or “flipped” within a week. Some reported to be flipped several times.
Conservative insiders picked up a load of quick gold. From this.
The not so profitable (gas generation) was picked up by the Parent Company of Great West Life who still owns them but with Natural Gas cheap these PPAs are worth a lot more.
At the end of this charade to jack up prices the cities ended up with the PPAs.
The battle for power generation continues.. Fording Coal owned large tracks of coal in Central Alberta. They wanted to build a generation plant there similar to Sundance at a factious name of Bow City Alberta. They were going to build their own power lines to Calgary and to Southern Alberta. This was in truth High River. TransAlta along with the Cons moved to stop this. They went so far as to privately fund environmental groups active at that time who were protesting a coal generation plant.
Since that time, ENMAX is building a gas generated plant outside of Calgary. This hit a big fight by EPCOR, TransAlta and the Conservative Government as it would negate the argument that southern lines were needed for Calgary.
We have a similar thing happening now (using water analogy) Municipalities in Southern Alberta are slated to export bulk water to the US with private holdings pocketing the profits. Insiders hard at work… All the available water allotments are out now and being banked by oil companies who are poised to sell them to municipalities.
The Liberals said earlier they would draw all the water allotments back into the Crown and redistribute as to need. If there is to be water export, the profits would come into the provincial treasury rather than Conservative insiders.
This same group of people are among the major contributors to the Wild Rose Party (2.1 million dollars) who are entirely on side with the Conservatives in all matters.
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February 20, 2012 at 9:36 pm
bleatmop
WRA and PCoA; two sides of the same coin. Will anyone be able to tell the difference between Premier Redford or Premier Smith?
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February 20, 2012 at 10:57 pm
electricity suppliers australia
I’ve been researching electricity prices in Australia after deregulation. Over the past decade, electricity prices have exploded, particuarly when compared to the CPI. Amongst all of this, electricity suppliers differ enormously in their pricing plans, with very little information available to consumers about how to search for the best deal.
The research I’ve been working on is categorical and my client (whom commissioned the work), is happy for me to share it if you are interested.
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February 21, 2012 at 11:10 am
cyberclark
In Alberta, the deregulation as such was no deregulation at all but a move to pump the utilities (including water) into the realm of the cities.
With this came the license to charge what ever they want for the utilities with no explanation of costs inferred.
For instance an expensive widget installation debt could be returned in a “line” charge. X dollars per bill opposite the heading “Widget” until the thing was paid for. This is not happening!
What does happen is layers upon layers of additional charges go onto the bills for paper, administration or whatever inventive name they can come up with.
This moved Edmonton water up to the highest priced water in the world according to April 2010 National Geographic.
Provincial funding for the cities dropped drastically while the utilities increased in prices. The money the Government saved was ploughed into reducing oil royalty which neither the Conservatives nor the Wild Rose party think we are entitled to.
Our utilities are now simply indirect taxation on a grande scale!
I will be supporting the Liberal Party of Alberta in this election.
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February 21, 2012 at 2:32 pm
Charlie Bredo
Have any of you considering supporting local electricity retailers?
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February 21, 2012 at 4:42 pm
The Arbourist
No.
Public utilities should be exactly that…for the public, and the public good.
That is all.
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February 22, 2012 at 8:38 am
VR Kaine
“Companies do not work for the pubic or the public good, they work to accrue the largest benefit of their shareholders and as noted above if swindling the people of Alberta is good for the bottom line, so be it.”
If you get to call me out on blanket generalizations about unions, then I get to call you out on the same re: companies, Arb! :) How your statement is written, then teachers work for a paycheck and care nothing about the students, union leaders care nothing about the worker and heads of charities are the same.
That aside, however, kudos for leveling blame on the government, the companies, and perhaps indirectly the media all the same. The more addressable problem here is not necessarily the individual players themselves but what ties all three together – their ability to conspire and collude.
Regardless of whether companies naturally care about customers or not they are forced to care because an unhappy customer can take their business elsewhere. Increase REAL competition, and services to the customers improve either through lower price, greater utility, or both. When governments protect or companies collude, however, there effectively is no “market” (because there’s no choice) and the system fails.
I agree with you that a company’s FIRST mandate is to provide a sustainable return to investors. Government’s first mandate, however, is to protect the people against what are easily unfair and even illegal business practices (only in big business is conspiracy not a crime!)
Unfortunately, however, we keep expanding government in the areas we shouldn’t be (handouts) and shrinking it in the areas we should (enforcement).
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February 22, 2012 at 11:01 am
The Arbourist
If you get to call me out on blanket generalizations about unions, then I get to call you out on the same
True, true it is a generalization. I should have been more specific, in the case of the the power situation in Alberta, Direct Energy a corporation with a history of avarice and irresponsible behaviour is currently working here in Alberta “they [Direct Energy] work to accrue the largest benefit of their shareholders and as noted above if swindling the people of Alberta is good for the bottom line, so be it.” —> There :)
individual players themselves but what ties all three together – their ability to conspire and collude.
Good for business in the short term, but stakeholders and eventually shareholders get the short end of the stick while others sometimes make out like kings. This is a point the is worth reiterating. The PC government in Alberta is way to close to the energy industry, whether it be oil or electricity. They’ve had 40 years to become entangled and corrupted a change is needed politically to reset the amount of collusion between the government and private industry.
Unfortunately, however, we keep expanding government in the areas we shouldn’t be (handouts) and shrinking it in the areas we should (enforcement).
Well said.
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February 22, 2012 at 3:39 pm
VR Kaine
they [Direct Energy] work to accrue the largest benefit of their shareholders and as noted above if swindling the people of Alberta is good for the bottom line, so be it.” —> There :)
Thanks! The universe is a little more balanced now. haha
Good for business in the short term, but stakeholders and eventually shareholders get the short end of the stick while others sometimes make out like kings.
That’s why as capitalist as I am, I’m against exorbitant pay. So you’re a CEO hired to run a company and are paid $5m/yr over 3 years (for example), how much can you care if the company performs poorly during that time? No matter what, you can’t care that much. One might say that it impacts their ability to get rehired, but I would disagree. Too many excuses available when there’s such a short time period. Look at coaches in hockey.
Biased as I am, I still think the crux of this is government doing their job, which means voters doing their job. Even if someone hates companies or capitalism, or hates government, we all still make out OK if we keep our focus on government doing their job of enforcing.
And by “voters doing there job”, that means myself as well. Corporately I pay attention to costs very closely, but personally, often times I don’t care about bills as long as I can afford them, so the shady ways those bills might have come about sometimes gets missed. As a voter, in industries where industry and government are in bed together, that’s wrong.
“Well said.
A rare moment for me, but good when it happens. :)
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