Wholesale electricity prices in Greece ranked as Europe’s second highest in the second quarter of 2018, 30 percent higher than the EU average, a study conducted by IOBE, the Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research, has shown.

The country’s elevated industrial energy costs stand as one of the industrial sector’s biggest disincentives, while the government’s energy policy has so far failed to deliver cost-related results, the study noted.

This is unquestionably affecting the level of competitiveness of Greece’s industrial sector, also grappling with a series of regulatory surcharges such as public service compensation (YKO), CO2 emission costs and RES-supporting ETMEAR costs. Adding to the industrial sector’s energy cost burden, the main power utility PPC is applying pressure for tariff hikes.

Acccording to Directorate-General for Energy data used in the study, second quarter wholesale electricity prices were 60.1 euros per MWh in Greece, 55.8 euros per MWh in the UK, 55.1 euros per MWh in Ireland, 36 euros per MWh in Germany and 33.9 euros per MWh in Bulgaria.

A recent PWC consulting firm study commissioned by Belgium’s regulatory authority for energy to compare the industrial electricity costs of Belgium, France, Germany and the Netherlands presented levels that were as much as 80 percent lower than those of Greece.