On September 14, the Council of Ministers approved a series of measures that seek to mitigate the impact that the price of electricity is having on Spanish households.
The reduction of taxes, the limit to the benefits of electricity or tax reductions to reduce the bill have been some of the key measures adopted by the Executive. In addition to these, the most innovative of all has been the obligation for the large electricity companies (Iberdrola, Endesa, Naturgy and Edp) to participate in auctions and sell part of the energy they generate based on their market share.
With this package of measures, the third vice president, Teresa Romero, announced that asavings on the final electricity bill of up to 22% , which can reach 30% in certain cases. According to estimates by the Organization of Consumers and Users (OCU), its application can lead to savings of 25 or 28 euros on the bill of an average household.
How do the measures affect the real price of electricity
The OCU has declared that taking into account the measures that have been applied, and the various factors that will derive from them, a “reduction in the concept of ‘charges ‘ Very important for the rest of the year.” That is to say, that the disproportionate price that is being paid for the concept of energy, which will maintain its limits as high as the market continues to mark, “will have as compensation the reduction in the concept of charges until December 31, when they will be reviewed again, as every year”.
The reductions will be applied both in the regulated rate PVPC (Voluntary Price for Small Consumers), and in free market rates The problem here lies in the free market, where, according to the OCU “values ​​have been established to discount the price if the final rate that the client has has a single price 24 hours a day or if he has a rate with the old DH”.
To make a more or less realistic estimate of what the socialist package of measures may entail, the OCU has taken as a reference the prices with which the wholesale market has closedthe last few months, and has roughly applied the recently approved measures.
The conclusion reached is divided according to the measures taken. On the one hand, “the reduction in charges will mean a saving of 17.22 euros on the bill for an average household (this reduction will continue even if the price of electricity changes)”.
On the other hand, the electricity tax, which has dropped from 5.1% to 0.1%, will be reduced, depending on the circumstances, between 2.5 and 4 euros.Finally, ” the reduction of VAT to 10% that has been applied for several months and is assuming a saving of between 5 and 8 euros depending on the scenario”.