Saskatchewan’s electricity rate will climb by 8 per cent rate over the next eight months, with an initial 4 per cent increase scheduled for September 1, 2022 and the remainder kicking in on April 1, 2023. Large commercial customers paying separate energy and demand charges may also experience some repercussions from a planned change in the allocation of costs across SaskPower’s various customer classes.

“World events have caused a significant rise in the price of natural gas, and with 42 per cent of Saskatchewan’s electricity coming from natural gas-fueled facilities, SaskPower requires additional revenue to maintain reliable operations,” says Don Morgan, the Minister responsible for the provincial utility.

The last electricity rate increase came into force in March 2018. SaskPower is projecting a $1.069 billion expenditure for fuel and power production for the 2023-24 fiscal year — up from $715 million in 2020-21.

Meanwhile, changes in rate distributions arise from moves to merge the current separate urban and rural electricity rates, and from a reassignment of some of the utility’s fixed costs for system infrastructure. Some of the latter had been embedded in the energy charge, but are now being applied to the demand charge. Resulting increases to the demand charge are expected to be greater than 4 per cent for 2023-24, whereas the energy charge will remain flat or possibly be lower than in 2022-23.

“Due to these changes, lower load factor customers (for whom fixed charges represent a greater portion of the bill) will see higher than average rate increases. Higher load factor customers will see lower than average rate increases, since the energy rates are a greater proportion of their total bill,” a report from the Saskatchewan Rate Review Panel states.