1943 Electricity Rates in Ontario

[Ric Murphy]

Good Day all,
Thought the members and visitors of this forum might find the documents below interesting. I live on my family's century farm (c1893) in Southwestern Ontario Canada. I found these documents years ago in some of my grandfathers stuff. We did not have electrical service here in the country until 1943 (before my time!). During the war there was a program to bring electrical service to farms to offset the labor shortage that resulted from the war. My grandfather applied for and was granted service upon installation of 3 electrically powered labor saving devices (washing machine, lighting and water pump). The documents below are related to the application, approval and rates for the service. One of the most interesting details isn't so much the rate/kwh but the usage amounts/month. Looks like today we use more/day than our forefathers used per month!!!! We've certainly become an electricity dependant society
Ric

[Joe Blake]

Wow,

My last electrical bill was 599 "units" (kw/h) for 56 days!!! And that's with all my solar panels etc - but that's also with my water condenser which draws 450 watts. Sometimes it might go 2-3 days without switching on, because I've got bottles and bottles (about 80 or so litres) of water which I've condensed when the humidity is high. Gets the most efficient use of power.

Joe

[Mark Parsons]

Interesting rates and changes in philosophy from 1943 to today. In 1943 it cost most for 1st 30kWh - 4 cents per kWh. Everything over 180 kWh was 3/4 cent. Volume discount as per free market pressures. I assume all costs were imbedded in the commodity price.

Today our cost per kWh is more after the first 1000 kwh per month. 5 cents for first 1000 kWh and 5.9 cents beyond. Reverse of free market pressure. Let's not forget the non-commodity plus, plus, plus... (debt retirement, transmission, distribution, line loss, demand charges, service charges, etc. etc.)

Anyone got any numbers for inflation from 1943 to 2008? What was 4 cents in 1943 worth today?

Mark

[Rob Beckers]

Mark, last time I checked our actual rate (in Ontario) came to just over 14 cents per kWh. As you noted, that 5 or 6 cents base rate doesn't include a great many things.

Not all is bad though: According to the Bank of Canada's inflation calculator (http://www.bankofcanada.ca/en/rates/inflation_calc.html) those 4 cents in 1943 are worth 49 cents now.

-RoB-

[Stellar Gellar]

hmm the rates from 1943 and today aren't that much different, considering the span of time.