Three energy suppliers, fined 18 million lei by ANRE

The National Energy Regulatory Authority (ANRE) fined three electricity suppliers with almost 18 million lei and sanctioned two others with a warning, because they purchased through the Centralized Electric Energy Purchase Mechanism (MACEE) a quantity of energy more than bigger than the portfolio they had, declared, yesterday, the president of ANRE, George Niculescu, during the press conference he held at the headquarters of the public institution.

George Niculescu specified: "With regard to the electricity suppliers who purchased quantities of electricity from the Centralized Electric Energy Purchase Mechanism - MACEE, where the price is 450 lei/MWh at which the producers are obliged to sell and the suppliers with end customers buy, we had an analysis done by the Monitoring Directorate and we noticed commercial companies that purchased larger quantities of energy than the supply portfolio they had. This triggered control actions that ended last week with a proposal for the Regulatory Committee to sanction five companies: two with a warning, three with a fine from the turnover. The fine is 14.4 million lei for one company, 1.45 million lei for another and 2.3 million lei for the third. Approximately 18 million lei were the sanctions".

Through MACEE, the most important producers are obliged to sell the entire production at a regulated fixed price of 450 lei/MWh to the operator of the Romanian centralized markets OPCOM. Furthermore, OPCOM redistributes energy at the same price to suppliers, distributors and the national transmission and system operator Transelectrica. Suppliers receive at the regulated price only the quantities of electricity they need to cover the consumption of their own customers.

The President of ANRE said that he could not give the names of the companies, because the fines were approved by the Regulatory Committee, but the procedure for communicating the minutes to the respective companies was not completed. Asked if he expects the respective fines to be contested by the companies, the head of ANRE indicated that each economic operator is free to act as he wishes in relation to the sanctioning minutes communicated, but specified: "In 2023, 124 files that concern important damages, of which 64 are ongoing, in 30 files we won definitively, in 28 files we have favorable sentences after the completion of the process at the court of first instance and we lost definitively only in 2 files sent to court".

According to Mr. Niculescu, the total amount of fines applied this year, until yesterday, amounts to 51 million lei (33 million lei before the 18 million lei applied recently), which is equivalent to a little over 10 million euros.

The President of ANRE showed that, during the eight months of his mandate, 15,620 petitions were registered and resolved, most in the field of electricity, respectively, 13,562. In the field of natural gas, 2,058 complaints were registered. For comparison, in 2021, 23,778 petitions were registered and in 2022 - 38,998 petitions.

Following these petitions in 2023, 919 control actions were carried out, of which 721 were surveillance, 126 inspection and 72 verification.

George Niculescu said: "The activity was very consistent. There are actions that the Authority has carried out, in the sense that it has increased the number of people working in these departments and petition resolution services. Compared to previous years, the number of petitions in 2023 has decreased. On the one hand, due to the fact that the energy market and things in the energy market have entered a more or less normal course and, on the other hand, the activity of resolving petitions within the authority has also improved. (...) Where we do not respond, we request the companies that are complained to us to respond and we monitor how quickly they respond".

In the top of reported problems, in the field of electricity, most were related to electricity billing, aspects related to prosumers and reading measurement groups, and in the field of gas, the billing method is the most complained about problem, followed by connection to the natural gas distribution system, as well as the construction of the installations.

Currently, 170 inspections by ANRE inspectors are underway.

• Tariffs for electricity distribution are increasing

The head of ANRE also said that two days ago the Regulatory Committee unanimously approved the tariffs for electricity distribution in 2024.

George Nculescu showed: "The analysis of these tariffs was a meticulous process, in which we took into account the proposals of the operators, and the tariffs will increase by an average of 3.39%, a value that is below 4.6% - the inflation rate forecast for next year. (...) I believe that distribution operators must make more investments from European funds, from where we have allocated 1.3 billion euros for electricity distribution networks. Without access to this money, I think the operators will have problems in supporting the respective networks and strengthening them".

Asked if next year the procedure for exiting from March 31, 2025, the compensation-ceiling scheme for electricity and natural gas prices will start, the president of ANRE said: "I publicly stated that what we will do in 2025, when the support scheme will end on 31 March, we have enough time to determine in the year 2024 when we will discuss with all the actors involved to get the phase-out action from the support scheme right, so that this measure does not produce a shock for energy consumers".

Regarding the tariff application policy in relation to licensed economic operators, George Niculescu stated that this year was the first time that ANRE reduced the amount of contributions charged by the Authority, even abolishing some tariffs, such as the fee for analyzing licensing, which actually represented a double taxation of economic agents.

The head of ANRE said: "We are talking about the analysis fee and licensing files. There was this fee at the Authority level where a license applicant paid a fee on the one hand to have his file analyzed and another fee for when that file was issued to him, namely the license. I believe that this fee is unnecessary since for the issuance of the respective license or authorization one goes through the process of analysis of the file anyway and thus I decided, together with my colleagues, to eliminate this double taxation, meeting those who apply for such licenses, accreditations from ANRE".

A new change in taxes targets electricity distributors, says the president of ANRE, a change that could reduce costs for the final consumer.

George Niculescu said: "Another thing we did: we reduced the tariff we were charging for the distribution and electricity transmission operators. The Regulatory Authority applies a 0.1% tariff for licensed supply activities, and a 0.2% tariff for distribution activities. We considered it normal to standardize them, by reducing that of the distribution operators and thus we reduced it to 0.1%. The impact is 6 million lei per year at the level of ANRE revenues, an additional expense that the distribution operators make, an expense that I hope will not be found in the distribution tariffs they will apply, obviously the colleagues will analyze the files, let's see if these expenditure components decrease in accordance with the decreases practiced by ANRE. It is the first time that the Regulatory Authority lowers the tariffs and does not increase them".

Mr. Niculescu also referred to the reimbursement to distributors of the amounts requested under the compensation and capping scheme for electricity bills issued in 2021, 2022 and 2023 and stated that ANRE had verified, until December 19, 2023, requests totaling 23 .36 billion lei.

We still have a few payment requests for 2021, for 2022 14 million lei are still due, and for the invoices issued for the current year, including August and September, requests worth 778 million lei were verified. This year, so far, we have approved settlements totaling 7.4 billion lei and we expect to reach 9 billion lei by the end of 2023. It is a decrease compared to last year when invoice differences of 14.5 billion lei were settled on the compensation-ceiling scheme. For next year, we estimate that the settlement will reach 3 billion or maximum 3.5 billion lei.

• We have over 100,000 prosumers

Regarding the prosumers, the ANRE president showed that, if in 2019 we had 905 prosumers in the field of wind and photovoltaic energy, so that in 2022 we would have 40,812 prosumers with a total installed power of 478 MWh, in October 2023 the total number of prosumers in the country ours has reached 101,605 which have a total installed capacity of 1298.94 MWh.

George Niculescu said: "We estimate that, by the end of the current year, the total installed power will reach 1.5 GW, which means almost the power provided by two of the units of the Cernavodă nuclear power plant".

Gabriel Andronache, the vice-president of ANRE that next year the total power installed by prosumers is expected to reach 2.5 GW, which would mean that from wind and photovoltaic we will have 4.1 GW (n.r. - the production capacities realized by the companies in this field are also added).

As for the quantitative compensation of prosumers, they still have to wait a few months, because the normative act that provided for this was sent back to Parliament by President Klaus Iohannis, who refused to promulgate it in its initial form, considering that the law contains provisions that contradicts the European energy directive.

Asked if specialized commissions in the Parliament and ANRE representatives participated in the debate of this law, President George Niculescu said that no one was present at the meetings of the commissions in the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies, but refused to specify whether the Authority was invited or not to those meetings and, if she was invited, why she didn't show up. Mr. Niculescu showed that he supports the point of view of President Klaus Iohannis regarding compliance with the European directive (ed. - regarding 400 kw - the maximum installed power of a prosumer, and not 900 kw as provided by the law adopted by the Parliament) and that awaiting the revision of the normative act by the Parliament to issue the secondary legislation regarding the quantitative compensation in the field of electricity.