Madrid (EFE) during the last month the downward trend of 2023 due to the greater share of renewables and the fall in natural gas.
According to the simulator of the National Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC), with a contracted power of 4.4 kilowatts and a monthly consumption of 250 kilowatt hours (KWh) distributed in the different periods (peak, flat and valley), A typical consumer in the regulated market will pay a bill of 48 euros in April.
This price is one of the lowest since the start of the pandemic, specifically since May 2020, when an average of 45.5 euros were paid, and is at levels similar to those registered in June 2020 and February 2021, both months with a price of 47.4 euros.
The wholesale market
In addition, it marks the lowest price of 2023 and falls 45% compared to the same month of the previous year, in the middle of the first phase of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Likewise, it will be 61% lower compared to the month of March 2022, when the electricity bill set its historical record (123 euros) due to the escalation of the wholesale price of electricity caused by the war in Ukraine.
Behind the drop in the electricity bill that households covered by the regulated market will pay is the drop in the wholesale market, which closed April with the second lowest price since May 2021, only surpassed by 70.9 euros /MWh of the last January, thanks to the weight of renewables and the fall in natural gas.
The regulated market recovers its attractiveness
This sustained drop in the electricity bill has returned to the regulated rate, known as PVPC, the “attractiveness” it had before the outbreak of the energy crisis, since historically it has always offered more advantageous conditions than the free market.
However, the spike in energy prices recorded in 2022 following the Russian invasion of Ukraine caused a mass exodus of customers to the free market, fleeing the volatility of the wholesale electricity market.
According to the latest data from the National Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC) consulted by EFE, at the end of 2022 there were 30.1 million electricity customers in Spain, of which 21.4 million were on the free market and 8.7 million in the regulated.
This means that the regulated tariff lost 1.4 million customers in one year in favor of the free market, which has been able to attract up to 1.6 million customers, also taking advantage of the increase in electricity contracts in Spain.
The reform of the PVPC, seeks approval
Although the regulated market could recover part of the clients that went to the free market looking for more stable rates in the coming months, the reform that the Government is preparing for the PVPC could subtract part of this “attractiveness”.
The new formula for calculating the production cost of regulated energy, which incorporates the adjustment term and partial indexation to a basket of futures, will foreseeably come into force as of January 1, 2024.
The reform of the PVPC is one of the commitments that Spain acquired with the European Commission to approve the cap on gas for electricity generation, in order to reduce exposure to the volatility of the daily market for consumers with that rate, and it should have entered into force at the beginning of the year.
The draft royal decree has already been studied by the Council of State, which will issue its opinion when the Council of Ministers approves the rule.