The production price is 38-50 percent of the cost paid by individuals for every MWh consumed, while the share of distribution tariffs is similar – between 36-50 percent. Tariffs for supplying electricity vary between 4-7 percent of the final amount, while the transport, system services, and market operator costs are of some 9-10 percent.
ANRE officials said there is nothing they can do at present. “The distribution costs are high, the network is old and requires investments, we cannot reform the market all of a sudden,” said representatives of the market regulator. ANRE’s President, Petru Lificiu, told Business Standard yesterday that the institution’s strategy is to maintain electricity prices unchanged throughout 2010, in spite of the fact that most energy production, transport, distribution, and supply operators requested an increase in tariffs as of 1 January. “Our plan is to have a rational production mix and not raise the price at all in 2010. We continue to analyze the requests of operators, but the authority’s strategy is to not approve tariff increases, at least until we emerge from recession,” said Lificiu.
Electricity consumption fell 9-10 percent at the national level in the first nine months of this year, due to the economic downturn, but, while demand in the industry decreased, the population purchased even more energy.
October data indicates that the economic decline has ended, and the outlook for November and December is of growth, the interim Minister of Economy, Adriean Videanu, said yesterday, in a press conference. “The sector with the largest contribution to put the brakes on Romania’s economic decline is the energy sector, which was in the black in terms of economic growth throughout all this time,” added Videanu.
