RAE expected to revise supplier surcharge in similar vein

RAE, the Regulatory Authority for Energy, is expected to reach a decision today on a controversial RES-supporting supplier surcharge, which has developed into a troubling issue for electricity suppliers, currently subduing commerical initiatives as a result of exorbitantly high surcharge levels reached.

According to energypress sources, a lower limit for the difference between the System Marginal Price (SMP) and the virtual SMP – the price that results when removing the influence of RES output on the SMP – will probably not be adopted.

Electricity suppliers have warned that adopting a lower limit would not only lead to excessive surcharges but also transform this supplier surcharge into a standard duty, which would be unlawful.

Electricity suppliers are also troubled – for the same reason – by the possible adoption of a weekly upper limit, which LAGIE, the Electricity Market Operator, has proposed should average 8 euros per MWh. It is well over the level required for sustainable electricity supply ventures.

RAE’s revisons may entail revising downwards its recent upper limit for the difference between the SMP and virtual SMP to no more than 20 euros per MWh, from 40 euros per MWh at present.

Rattled by the recent sharp rises of the supply surcharge, independent electricity suppliers want revisions to apply retroactively, from when the surcharge was introduced in October, not as of the two-month period covering January and February, as planned by RAE.

The main power utility PPC, banking on its dominant electricity market share of nearly 90 percent, recently declared it refuses to cover the surcharge. The utility does not fear being removed from the electricity suppliers registry, as authorities have threatened to do if suppliers do not pay up, because of the overwhelming dependence of consumers on its electricity supply.