Most condominium corporations and rental housing landlords will need to make capital investments in energy storage to realize the benefits of Ontario's ultra-low overnight electricity rate.

As the country moves to accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles, questions are brewing among people living in multi-unit dwellings.

After 2022, companies must use their own funds to reimburse embedded energy managers, but will be offered “an enhanced level of technical support and resources.” It's a move some see as more short-sighted.

For now, residential and small business customers enrolled for either time-of-use (TOU) rates or tiered pricing under the provincial regulated price plan will be charged the off-peak TOU rate of 8.5 cents per kilowatt-hour for all electricity consumption.

The six-month extension comes with an improved rate since the discount on pre-tax electricity consumption and transmission/distribution costs will increase to 33.2 per cent on November 1.

A promised $2 billion investment in large-scale building retrofits will be central to the Canadian government’s job creation ambitions. Energy efficiency champions have plenty of ideas of how and where the funds could be best leveraged.

Many hydro accounts specifically tied to the common areas of multi-residential buildings will no longer qualify for the 31.8 per cent rebate beginning in November 2020.

A temporary adjustment to Ontario’s electricity pricing scheme eliminates cost-saving opportunities that many operators of large commercial buildings were anticipating this summer.

The energy demand load has shifted in sync with much of Ontario’s workforce from commercial to home offices, prompting calls for suspension of time-of-use pricing during the current COVID-19 related upheaval

Owners of smaller commercial and multi-residential buildings in Ontario will still be welcome to voluntarily share energy and water consumption data, but a looming deadline for mandatory disclosure has been withdrawn.

It's still unclear how the process of securing environmental approvals for combined heat and power systems will be streamlined, but the Ontario government's recent pledge has been greeted enthusiastically in the buildings sector.

The Ontario NDP's proposed plan would focus efforts to manage peak demand more narrowly on the Industrial Conservation Initiative and voluntary residential programs enabled through smart grid technology.

The new rules that will steer the installation of electric vehicle charging stations at Ontario condo properties starting next week may have a blind spot.

Some condo boards in Ontario are looking for loopholes to a coming energy reporting requirement, but there are none for large buildings captured by the regulation.