A tariff on energy imported from Canada would almost certainly raise the extremely high cost of electricity in New York, experts on the state’s complex power grid said.
But how much is just a guessing game at this point, they said, because the state’s power supply is so intertwined with Canada’s.
New York imports electricity from Canada, most of it produced by hydroelectric power plants. But Canada also gets some of its power from New York.
“New York as a state imports and exports to Canada on the daily,” said Marguerite Wells, executive director of Alliance for Clean Energy New York. “There are electrons going back and forth all the time.”
On Monday afternoon, Canada was doing the importing, said Daniel A. Zarrilli, former chief climate adviser for New York City. But overnight, the power was flowing the other way across the border, he said.
Not much, if any, of that Canadian power reaches New York City. But the city is tied to the statewide grid, so cost increases ripple from one end to another.
About the only certainty, Mr. Zarrilli said, was that a tariff of 10 percent or more would add costs that would be passed on to consumers to some extent.
“We’re basically putting more cost on the system,” he said. “I have no means of putting a number on it, other than thinking the pass-through costs of the electricity generation are just going to go up.”
In November, the price of residential electricity in New York was about 45 percent higher than the national average, at about 25 cents per kilowatt-hour, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Ms. Wells, who lives upstate, said she assumed her electric bill would rise at least a little. But she pointed out that the tariff should affect only the cost of the energy she uses, not the price she pays her utility company to deliver it.
Only about one-third of a New Yorker’s electric bill covers the energy used; the rest goes toward delivery and a variety of fees and charges, she said. So, as an example, a 10 percent tariff might add about $3 to a $100 monthly bill, she said.
President Trump said he would place a 25 percent tariff on Canadian imports starting Tuesday, though under an exception the tax would be 10 percent for energy products. There was some confusion on Monday about which tariff level would apply to energy from renewable sources like hydroelectric, wind and solar power.
Not even the agency that oversees the state’s power grid, the New York Independent System Operator, would provide an estimate of the proposed tariff’s impact on consumers. Kevin Lanahan, a spokesman for the system operator, said it was “actively pursuing guidance” on how the electricity market would be affected.
“The U.S. and Canada have one of the most integrated electric grids in the world, allowing system operators in both countries to pool resources for improved reliability and economic efficiency,” he said.
Indeed, Quebec is expected to provide a major new source of renewable power to New York City through a 340-mile transmission line — the Champlain Hudson Power Express — that is being built along the Hudson River. How a tariff would affect that project, currently scheduled for completion next year, was unclear on Monday.
“If there’s a tariff regime in place in a year and a half when that comes on line, there’s a chance that the electricity prices will be higher than people are expecting,” Mr. Zarrilli said.
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