On Mon, 20 Jan 2020 22:00:03 -0500, wrote:

A few years ago - my daughter, in Quebec,
installed an electric furnace !
.. not too many sold in Ontario lately.
John T.
Jihn, there are several reasons for this discrepancy besides the
lower cost of Hydro in Quebec.
First of all,Natural Gas is not available to the majority of quebec
residents outside major centers, and outside the eastern townships.
Natural gas is the lowest cost heating option throughout virtually all
of Canada where it is available.
Second - While natural gas is 30% cheaper than electricity in Quebec,
it is HALF the price of heating oil - the old standby - making
electricity roughly 20% less than oil (I didn't do the calculation -
so that's why Isaid roughly -)

From Embridge Quebec:
The following is an example of the cost comparison calculation for a
year’s use of oil and natural gas, taking into consideration the fuel
efficiency of your 15 or more year-old furnace and a new natural gas
furnace one:

Calculation of the annual cost of heating with oil:
2,000 litres of oil consumed x $0.91** = $1,820 (your annual oil bill)

Comparing the cost of heating with oil and with natural gas, taking
into consideration the furnace’s fuel efficiency:
2,000 l of oil x 70% efficiency = 1,400 l used for heating
1,400 l x 1.03 m3 = 1,442 m3 of natural gas required to heat for a
year
1,442 m3 x $0.520/m3*** = $750 (estimated annual cost of heating with
natural gas)

Annual saving from using natural gas as your energy source: $1,070


Third - The third option is Propane.About 85 per cent of the propane
used in Quebec is shipped by rail from Sarnia, Ont. - making it more
expensive than in Ontario - and then it needs to be trucked from
Montreal or whatever rail head it is offloaded at. In many areas of
quebec that trucking expense is far from trivial, and during hard
winters the trucks have difficulty getting to many areas when needed.
The price of propane fluctuates severely with supply in any given
region.

Even in Ontario, propane prices have been very volatile over the last
number of years, affected by rail strikes, bad weather, and other
issues.

1 l of oil = 10.8 kWh of electricity = 1.03 m3 of natural gas = 1.53 l
of propane gas.

If propane, oil and natural gas cost the same - 1 liter of Propane or
oil to 1 cubic meter of natural gas, propane would still cost 50% more
because of it's lower heat value.

All this makes electric heat more attractive to many users in Quebec
compared to Ontario. Of course, with quebec electricity costs running
at about HALF of Ontario prices - just over half of Vancouver or
Miami -and one quarter of New York - it doesn't hurt either!!!!!!
Plug 7 cents a Kw H into the therm equasion vs 14 cents - - - -