Alberta Energy Market Report – Week of August 24-30, 2026

Week in one line: Alberta’s wholesale power price averaged $64.98/MWh for August 24–30 against $56.03/MWh the week before — up 16% — but the entire week’s cost landed in its first three days, and the median hour fell 46% to $16.30/MWh. Retail electricity edged down. Natural gas remains historically cheap.

Reporting week: August 24–30, 2026. Published August 31, 2026. Wholesale data from AESO; gas reference pricing from the Government of Alberta; retail rates from Get Energy’s live rate sheet.

Wholesale power: the week in numbers

Metric	Aug 24–30	Aug 17–23	Change
Average pool price	$64.98/MWh	$56.03/MWh	+16%
Median hour	$16.30/MWh	$30.08/MWh	−46%
Highest hour	$972.61/MWh (Aug 26, HE19)	$958.27/MWh (Aug 22, HE20)	—
Lowest hour	$0.00/MWh	$0.00/MWh	—
Hours above $100/MWh	14	18	−4
Hours at or near zero	32	6	+26
Average Alberta internal load	10,448 MW	10,441 MW	+7 MW
Peak load	11,851 MW	11,616 MW	+235 MW

The 30-day rolling average for the period ending August 30 sits at $44.24/MWh, up from $34.65/MWh a week earlier. That is the first meaningful move in the rolling average in a month, and it reflects two consecutive weeks with a $900-plus hour in them.

What actually happened

The average rose while the typical hour got cheaper. Daily averages tell the story plainly: $164.18 Monday, $122.15 Tuesday, $112.75 Wednesday, then $15.83 Thursday, $19.59 Friday, $14.59 Saturday and $5.75 Sunday. The first three days of the week cost more than the last four combined, several times over.

Monday through Wednesday brought the tightest supply conditions of the month, with the pool price reaching $972.61/MWh in hour ending 19 on Wednesday August 26 — the evening ramp again, the same hour band that produced the previous week’s high. Fourteen hours cleared $100/MWh over the seven days, four fewer than the week before, and almost all of them fell in that opening stretch.

Then the floor dropped out. Thirty-two hours settled at or near zero, against six the week prior, and Sunday August 30 averaged $5.75/MWh across the full day. Near-zero hours in Alberta track wind output: when the fleet runs hard into moderate late-August demand, there is more energy offered than the system needs and the price collapses to the floor. The back half of the week was one of the cheapest stretches of the summer.

Demand did not drive any of this. Average internal load was 10,448 MW, essentially flat on the week’s 10,441 MW, and peak load of 11,851 MW is ordinary for late August. Supply availability set both ends of the range — scarce in the first three evenings, abundant for the last four days.

Natural gas

The Government of Alberta’s natural gas reference price has run $2.46/GJ in January, $1.95 in February, $1.69 in March, $1.28 in April, $1.16 in May and $1.37 in June — the most recent month published. The series remains well below the $2.71/GJ that closed 2025.

Alberta is still in the injection season, with heating load effectively nil and storage the main call on supply. Cheap gas continues to cap power prices in the majority of hours, because gas-fired units set the marginal price most of the time. The hours that price above $100 are the ones where the cheap marginal unit is not available. What matters for households is the winter strip, not the August print.

Where retail rates sit

Product	Rate (Aug 31, 2026)	Week over week
Electricity — variable (30-day avg, calculated Aug 24)	5.24¢/kWh	−0.07¢
Electricity — 1-year fixed	6.57¢/kWh	Unchanged
Electricity — 2-year fixed	7.97¢/kWh	Unchanged
Electricity — 3-year fixed	8.87¢/kWh	Unchanged
Natural gas — 30-day discount moving average (calculated Aug 21, includes transaction fee)	$3.87/GJ	See note
Natural gas — 1-year fixed	$3.77/GJ	Unchanged
Rate of Last Resort (default)	12.01–12.06¢/kWh	Fixed to Dec 31, 2026

Two notes on the table. First, the variable electricity rate is calculated as of August 24, so it captures the tail of the previous week but none of this week’s expensive Monday-to-Wednesday hours; expect upward pressure on the next calculation. Second, the natural gas variable figure is quoted here on the published 30-day discount moving average basis, which includes the transaction fee — it is not directly comparable to the gas variable number shown in last week’s edition, which was quoted on a different basis. Future editions will use the discount moving average consistently.

The default Rate of Last Resort remains roughly double the competitive variable rate, and it does not move with the pool price in either direction.

Regulatory and market news

• Pembina Institute analysis on data centre load. The Pembina Institute published independent analysis concluding that Meta’s planned hyperscale data centre in Sturgeon County could add between $270 and $460 a year to a typical Albertan’s electricity bill once operating, modelling the 2027–2031 window. The analysis estimates a roughly 6% reduction in the transmission portion of bills from the connection, outweighed by market-price effects, and attributes much of the pressure to rules that let large loads connect before their own generation comes online. This is advocacy-group analysis, not a regulatory determination, but it is the most detailed public estimate of ratepayer impact to date and it broadly aligns with cautions raised by generators and the AESO.
• AUC data centre generation decision. In Decision 30732-D01-2026 the Alberta Utilities Commission ruled on the Synapse Real Estate data centre power plant project near Olds. The Commission subsequently stated that the conclusion in that case is not an indicator of how any other application will be decided, including the Greenlight facility proposed to serve the Sturgeon County data centre. For ratepayers, the practical read is that each large-load generation project is being assessed on its own record rather than through a general policy line.
• Restructured Energy Market. The REM ISO Rules were approved by regulation earlier this year and the AESO continues participant-readiness work toward implementation. Nothing in the transition changes residential rates today; the relevant date for households is the second Rate of Last Resort term.
• Rate of Last Resort. Unchanged at 12.01 to 12.06¢/kWh and fixed through December 31, 2026. Under AUC Decision 29204-D01-2024, rates for the January 1, 2027 to December 31, 2028 term are set under the providers’ approved energy price setting plans and must be filed at least 30 days before January 1, 2027. That filing remains the item to watch this fall.

What this means if your contract is up

Two weeks in a row now, the weekly average has been set by a handful of evening hours while the typical hour got cheaper. That is the defining feature of the Alberta market right now, and it is worth understanding before choosing between fixed and variable. Variable exposes you to those hours; fixed does not. Over the past year, the hours were few enough that variable came out ahead.

The arithmetic today: the 30-day variable average of 5.24¢/kWh sits about 1.33¢ below the one-year fixed rate of 6.57¢/kWh. That gap is what certainty costs. The 30-day rolling wholesale average has moved from $34.65 to $44.24/MWh in a week, so the variable side is not standing still, and September is when Alberta typically starts pricing in the turn toward heating season. Neither position is wrong. The default Rate of Last Resort, at roughly double either, is the one that is hard to justify.

We publish this report every Monday. The reasoning behind the fixed-or-variable decision is set out in fixed vs variable electricity rates in Alberta, and current rates are always on our rates page.

Sources

• AESO market and system reporting — hourly pool price and Alberta internal load, August 17–30, 2026. Retrieved August 31, 2026.
• Government of Alberta — Alberta natural gas reference price — monthly $/GJ series through June 2026. Retrieved August 31, 2026.
• Pembina Institute — analysis of the Meta data centre’s impact on Alberta electricity bills. Retrieved August 31, 2026.
• Alberta Utilities Commission — current electricity rates and decisions, including Decision 30732-D01-2026. Retrieved August 31, 2026.
• Utilities Consumer Advocate — default rates — Rate of Last Resort, 12.01–12.06¢/kWh to December 31, 2026. Retrieved August 31, 2026.
• AESO — Restructured Energy Market. Retrieved August 31, 2026.

Get Energy is a competitive retailer in Alberta, a tradename of Utility Network & Partners Inc.