Household electricity prices in Greece last year were below the EU average while the country ranked 11th in the EU, Nikos Boulaxis, the chief executive of RAE, the Regulatory Authority for Energy, noted during a speech at the ongoing Thessaloniki International Fair.
The RAE boss admitted that leeway for further improvement exists, especially with regulated charges such as the Public Service Compensation (YKO) – included on electricity bills to primarily subsidize high-cost electricity production on Greece’s non-interconnected islands and also offer lower-cost electricity to underpriviledged households – and a RES-supporting ETMEAR surcharge, despite improvements made over recent years.
YKO costs have remained steady since 2012 but ETMEAR charges dropped considerably, by 9 percent during 2016 and 2017, Boulaxis informed, adding that this decline would continue into 2018.
Boulaxis noted that electricity price drops ranging between 15 and 25 percent, compared to 2015, were made possible by intensifying competition, reduced primary energy costs, especially natural gas, as well as regulatory interventions that lowered the cost of various market mechanisms.
The RAE chief underlined that electricity network usage costs for consumers were reduced by 6 percent for transmission and 3 percent for distribution over the past two years.