Brandon Electricity Retailers and Natural Gas Providers
The entirety of the businesses and homeowners in Brandon are supplied with their electricity by Manitoba Hydro, the provincial electric utility. Because of Manitoba’s current market regulations, residents of Brandon do not have the option to purchase electricity from a third-party electricity retailer.
However, while Manitoba Hydro is also the regulated natural gas supplier in the province, residents and business owners can contract with retail natural gas suppliers, potentially lowering natural gas costs by a significant amount.
Currently, retailers of natural gas serving customers in Brandon include:
Depending on the season and current market conditions, offerings and the availability of services may vary. Natural gas plans may include options such as fixed rates, variable rates, monthly fixed price plans, and combinations thereof. To see and compare the options currently available to residents of Brandon, fill out the rate comparison form above.
Brandon Electricity and Natural Gas History
The founding of Brandon was a quirk of fate. In the 1870s, settlers closely watched the development of the transcontinental railway that would one day span the entirety of Canada. Territories where the tracks were laid down would have ready access to transportation and supplies, the fuel necessary to turn a shanty into a city.
Many anticipated that the railway would run through either (what are now) Rapid City or Minnedosa. But the railway’s engineers had a last-minute change of heart, and shifted the route to run through Grand Valley. Settlers quickly changed plans and converged on the location, with the first arriving in 1879. In 1881, Thomas Rosser, the chief engineer of the Canadian Pacific Railway arrived in the area to make the final determination of where the tracks would run, as well as the location of the townsite that would spring up alongside it. Ultimately, Rosser chose a site south of the Assiniboine River, and dubbed the area Brandon. Within a year, so many people had moved there that Brandon was incorporated as a city in May of 1882, without having been recognized as a town or village previously.
In 1888, the Brandon Electric Light Company was founded, and construction of a steam generating station was completed the next year. Access to electricity helped to fuel the economy further, and the city grew from 700 to more than 5,000 people by 1891. In 1900, the first hydroelectric generating plant in Manitoba was built by the Brandon Electric Light Company on the Little Saskatchewan River. The plant provided electricity to the city’s residents, located 14 kilometers to the east, via an 11,000-volt line.
In 1907, the Brandon Gas & Power Company was incorporated. In 1921, the company merged with the Brandon Electric Light Company to form the Canada Gas & Electric Corporation of Brandon, with the new company continuing to supply the residents of Brandon with electricity and natural gas. However, this came to an end when the Manitoba Power Commission (MPC)—the provincial company charged with providing power to communities outside of Winnipeg—purchased the company in 1931. By 1933, municipal contracts with Brandon and other cities were canceled, with MPC serving homeowners and businesses directly, rather than having municipal utilities acting as a middleman.
In 1961, MPC merged with the Manitoba Hydro Electric Board to form Manitoba Hydro, which still continues to be the sole supplier of electricity in Brandon, as well as the regulated rate provider of natural gas.
