Enmax Bills

[Ironhorse]

Anybody else get raped on their bills for the second month in a row? Like, WTF? At least this month's bill was a tiny bit better than last month, but it only felt like a half hearted kiss after the fact.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Ironhorse

Anybody else get raped on their bills for the second month in a row? Like, WTF? At least this month's bill was a tiny bit better than last month, but it only felt like a half hearted kiss after the fact.

Mine was back to my Monthly average I set aside.

Each year in June I average out the last 12 bills add 10% and put that in an account each month and then I don’t worry about the fluctuating rates. It builds up a surplus through the summer and drains it during the winter and I get some beer money back every June.

[Calgary14]

I thought I read somewhere only ~65% of your total bill relates to actual usage and the rest is just fees and taxes

For a shoulder season (ie. no AC yet and very little heating) I thought my bill would be lower but then again I almost always think that

[Calgary14]

Add on fees on utility bills have doubled since 2010: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...ills-1.6411674

[Lubicon]

Originally Posted by Calgary14

Add on fees on utility bills have doubled since 2010: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...ills-1.6411674

'In particular, rates for access to the electrical grid and back alley power lines have more than doubled since 2010, when the province embarked on an effort to modernize and beef up the system. '

News flash, upgrading our electrical system costs money and the user is the one who foots the bill. I hate the add ons as much as anyone and some seem pretty arbitrary but the ones the pay for our grid are pretty simple to understand.

[gasman]

So I'm an Engineer, and obviously as such, I have an unhealthy relationship with Spreadsheets.

I installed Solar late last year, and I have been building a sheet to track my actual savings for the purpose of calculating payback, part of that is taking my bill and writing formulas in excel to calculate all the Transmission/Distribution Fees, so that I can "predict" what my bill without solar would have been.

So I went through 12 months of Atco bills and on not one of them could I get my spreadsheet to calculate the same value for the T&D charges. I was always off by just a little bit - within 5% but it should have been to the penny, since the calculations are not that difficult. I am convinced that Atco/Enmax are constantly changing billing dates, sometime including the days on either end of a period, sometimes including 1, sometimes including none, and it is impossible to actually reconcile a bill.

In addition to the sketchy T&D calcs Atco was going back and changing previous months energy usage even when they were using actual meter readings in the first place - this was most likely because my net meter wasn't installed at the beginning and some months I would show "negative" energy usage and they didn't know what to do, other than credit back my past 6 months of energy usage, then rebill everything using made up numbers for that period. My bills were a complete mess.

On top of those issued, the microgen credits for solar were always a month behind the energy charges... WTF its the same meter, my energy for the period would be for October 14 - November 18th but the microgen credits would be for September 16- October14.... Its the same meter, same readings - ATCO blamed Enmax for providing the readings at different times.

I just changed to Foothills Energy COOP, because of their solar program - on the first 2 bills - my spreadsheet calculation matched their bill to the penny.... Also they clearly provide the energy charges and the microgen charges for the same period.

Conclusion: ATCO/Enmax are doing some shady #### with their billing

[timun]

I don't have any solar but I've also done the same sort of calculations in spreadsheets, and I find the discrepancy is usually the Local Access Fee. It is 11.11% of the Distribution Tariff (Transmission Charge + Distribution Charge) plus 11.11% of the Energy Charge charged at the Regulated Rate Option. The RRO fluctuates, so it's not always clear to me how many kWh are charged at what RRO rate.

[GoinAllTheWay]

Spreadsheets reduce me to a crying mess. I absolutley suck at them.

[gasman]

Originally Posted by timun

I don't have any solar but I've also done the same sort of calculations in spreadsheets, and I find the discrepancy is usually the Local Access Fee. It is 11.11% of the Distribution Tariff (Transmission Charge + Distribution Charge) plus 11.11% of the Energy Charge charged at the Regulated Rate Option. The RRO fluctuates, so it's not always clear to me how many kWh are charged at what RRO rate.

I think you hit the nail on the head,they aren't transparent with which RRO rates or tarrif rates apply because they don't spell out how many kW are in each period (not that they even know that, as they are only getting 1 or 2 datapoints per period, and estimating the rest).

[#-3]

Originally Posted by gasman

So I'm an Engineer, and obviously as such, I have an unhealthy relationship with Spreadsheets.

I installed Solar late last year, and I have been building a sheet to track my actual savings for the purpose of calculating payback, part of that is taking my bill and writing formulas in excel to calculate all the Transmission/Distribution Fees, so that I can "predict" what my bill without solar would have been.

So I went through 12 months of Atco bills and on not one of them could I get my spreadsheet to calculate the same value for the T&D charges. I was always off by just a little bit - within 5% but it should have been to the penny, since the calculations are not that difficult. I am convinced that Atco/Enmax are constantly changing billing dates, sometime including the days on either end of a period, sometimes including 1, sometimes including none, and it is impossible to actually reconcile a bill.

In addition to the sketchy T&D calcs Atco was going back and changing previous months energy usage even when they were using actual meter readings in the first place - this was most likely because my net meter wasn't installed at the beginning and some months I would show "negative" energy usage and they didn't know what to do, other than credit back my past 6 months of energy usage, then rebill everything using made up numbers for that period. My bills were a complete mess.

On top of those issued, the microgen credits for solar were always a month behind the energy charges... WTF its the same meter, my energy for the period would be for October 14 - November 18th but the microgen credits would be for September 16- October14.... Its the same meter, same readings - ATCO blamed Enmax for providing the readings at different times.

I just changed to Foothills Energy COOP, because of their solar program - on the first 2 bills - my spreadsheet calculation matched their bill to the penny.... Also they clearly provide the energy charges and the microgen charges for the same period.

Conclusion: ATCO/Enmax are doing some shady #### with their billing

Any chance you could share some of your data? I'd be curious to see a real world sample of the business case.

[timun]

Originally Posted by gasman

I think you hit the nail on the head,they aren't transparent with which RRO rates or tarrif rates apply because they don't spell out how many kW are in each period (not that they even know that, as they are only getting 1 or 2 datapoints per period, and estimating the rest).

I know that when your bill straddles two different rate periods they will do an assumed split between them, but I don't know how that's determined. It doesn't seem to be spread equally over every day in the billing period.

Otherwise when I do the calculations the T&D charges, rate riders, etc. usually work out perfectly, or are off by a cent due to rounding.

[gasman]

Originally Posted by #-3

Any chance you could share some of your data? I'd be curious to see a real world sample of the business case.

I plan to start posting monthly next month, in the solar thread, with updates on how it goes month by month.

I have some personal data in the excel sheet, so I will have to clean that up, before I can share it.

[gasman]

Originally Posted by timun

I know that when your bill straddles two different rate periods they will do an assumed split between them, but I don't know how that's determined. It doesn't seem to be spread equally over every day in the billing period.

Otherwise when I do the calculations the T&D charges, rate riders, etc. usually work out perfectly, or are off by a cent due to rounding.

one penny isn't a big deal, multiple pennies make my eye twitch.

I've tweaked my spreadsheet, I did update the Local Access Fee to get me "within multiple cents".

The LAF is described as 11.11% of the Total Revenue from the Distribution Tariff, + 11.11% of the RRO per KWh

I was mistakenly assuming Distribution Tariff = Distribution Charge, but I think in actuality it is the sum of:
Distribution Charge
Transmission Charge
Rater Rider
Deferred Adjustments

If anyone is interested here is a quick version of my prediction tool. My whole purpose was to prove a tool that gets within a few cents so that I can go back and predict what my bill would be without solar, to accurately determine what my savings actually are.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

[#-3]

Originally Posted by gasman

I plan to start posting monthly next month, in the solar thread, with updates on how it goes month by month.

I have some personal data in the excel sheet, so I will have to clean that up, before I can share it.

That's awesome

[csnarpy]

Originally Posted by gasman

I plan to start posting monthly next month, in the solar thread, with updates on how it goes month by month.

I have some personal data in the excel sheet, so I will have to clean that up, before I can share it.

I’m curious as to how many panels your using.

[gasman]

Originally Posted by csnarpy

I’m curious as to how many panels your using.

27 - 375Watt panels

Longi 375LR4-60

19 facing due south
8 facing due east

[timun]

Originally Posted by gasman

one penny isn't a big deal, multiple pennies make my eye twitch.

I've tweaked my spreadsheet, I did update the Local Access Fee to get me "within multiple cents".

The LAF is described as 11.11% of the Total Revenue from the Distribution Tariff, + 11.11% of the RRO per KWh

I was mistakenly assuming Distribution Tariff = Distribution Charge, but I think in actuality it is the sum of:
Distribution Charge
Transmission Charge
Rater Rider
Deferred Adjustments

If anyone is interested here is a quick version of my prediction tool. My whole purpose was to prove a tool that gets within a few cents so that I can go back and predict what my bill would be without solar, to accurately determine what my savings actually are.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

I looked at your spreadsheet and I see you seem to have combined the Balancing Pool Allocation with the rate riders, and that and the Utility Deferral Adjustment you've noted as "no way to predict - just carry over". Note that these riders are publicly available on Enmax's website in the Distribution Tariff Rate Schedule you linked in the spreadsheet, toward the back of the document. The current and historical ones are at https://www.enmax.com/business/elect...ibution-tariff.

The rate riders usually change quarterly or annually, so when a billing period straddles the end of the calendar year it becomes a bit of a pain to estimate, because different rates will apply depending on how they apportion your usage across the two different rate periods, something which seems to inevitably screw up my math...

[tvp2003]

Wow, I was on the Enmax website and it looks like the current fixed rates for electricity and gas are 8.49 cents/kWh and $4.79/GJ. Current variable rates are quite a bit higher.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised but it was still a bit of a shock to see...

[timun]

Note that you can sign up for the 5-year 8.49¢/kWh contract and break it with a month's notice anyway if/when fixed rates drop in future.

[DoubleK]

The economic withholding going on with the generators right now is incredible.

I shudder to think what will happen when the province sees the typically high loads in July and August.