During the 20th June meeting of Latvian Saeima’s Environment, Climate and Energy Sub-Committee officials discussed the new power system service tariffs that will come into force on the 1st of July. The discussion became heated about the need for a sustainable energy strategy in the country.
“Our commitment to becoming an exporter of energy is praiseworthy. But we need to remember that this requires additional investments into infrastructure – we need serious, and unprecedented investments into de-synchronisation, new inter-connections, renewable energy parks, balancing output and international connections for exports.
This means an increase of tariffs in the future,
and it would be wrong to cover that from households’ wallets,” said the chairman of Saeima’s Environment, Climate and Energy Sub-Committee Andris Kulbergs.
He believes “this demonstrates how much Latvia has lacked a sustainable energy strategy until now”. Kulbergs said a lack of such a strategy results in there being no solution for households that use solar panels and which want to transition from gas heating systems to heat pumps and use electric vehicles every day.
The new electricity system service tariffs that will come into force on the 1st of July will have a tariff period of four and a half years for Sadales tīkls and two and a half years for Augstsprieguma tīkls.
Saeima deputies said the new tariffs are beneficial for large manufacturers and will help reduce cross-subsidies. However, they will also cause bills to go up – especially for households with three-phase connection.
Tariff growth will also affect local producers and small companies.
Answering questions asked by Saeima deputies, system service providers said the tariff growth was largely affected by the rise of electricity prices and high inflation. Sadales tīkls representatives said the connected but unused output presents a major challenge for the transmission system. They invited consumers to optimise consumption by dropping unused connections.
Businesses need price stability, as members of the sub-committee said, inviting the parliament to find balance between short-term and long-term tariff periods. Members of the committee also outlined the need for a convincing and clear energy policy. It is also necessary to encourage residents to invest in energy efficiency.
“The sub-committee calls for consideration to be given to excluding part of the losses from the calculation of the tariff and for the Public Utilities Commission to re-assess the possibility of doubling profits for infrastructure maintainers,” the sub-committee’s chairman said.
Kulbergs also said they will continue discussions about energy consumption reduction efforts and will invite the ministry responsible for the sector to report on the net settlement system.
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