Last year’s November and December brought a rather harsh frost to the Baltic Sea coastal countries, and people felt it very well when they received their electricity and heat bills this month. Meanwhile, January has been much warmer than normal so far, which will be reflected in February’s bills for many. However, a lot depends on the type of service chosen by the particular household.
For example, in Estonia, it is possible to buy electricity both on the stock exchange and to use the so-called universal service offered by the concern “Eesti Energia”, reports the Estonian public media ERR. It is difficult to predict which will be more profitable. In the cold December, recipients of the universal service were in a better situation, but since the onset of warmer weather, they have to pay more for electricity than those who buy it at exchange prices. One of the department heads of “Eesti Energia”, Armens Kasparovs, in a conversation with ERR, reminded that the universal service is one of the types of state grants, according to which household expenses are covered from the budget, when the price of electricity exceeds 19.24 cents per kilowatt hour. Currently, around 149,000 households use this service. “In December, the exchange price was higher than 31 cents per kilowatt-hour, but our customers still paid the same fixed 19.24 cents. But now they have to pay a little more, because since December 24 of last year, with the onset of warmer weather and lower consumption, the exchange price has fell,” explained Kasparov. ERR emphasizes that the exchange price did not drop a little, but tripled and is currently only a little more than 10 cents per kilowatt-hour, so the recipients of the universal service are already overpaying significantly. Kasparov admitted that with the steady arrival of spring, i.e. with April, exchange prices will most likely be lower than the prices of the universal service, but no one prevents customers from refusing this package by notifying the company seven days in advance.
Just like in Estonia, citizens in Lithuania can also choose between different electricity suppliers – at some point one offer is more advantageous, and at another another again, writes the internet version of the “Respublika” newspaper. The media interviewed Darja Maikshten, the head of the “Ignitis Group” company, who emphasized that those residents who chose this company last year as an independent electricity supplier with fixed prices saved almost 200 million euros last year. “Ignitis group” ensures the supply of electricity to 929.8 thousand households, or more than 78% of the country’s population, and most of them pay a fixed amount for electricity, which does not depend on stock exchange fluctuations. Lithuanian media indicate that concerns about the electricity deficit have turned out to be exaggerated, because all the countries of the Baltic region connected to the unified energy network, contrary to fears, at least this winter have fully provided themselves with natural gas, which is one of the main fuels for obtaining electricity.
A rather optimistic situation prevails in Sweden as well, writes the newspaper “Expressen”. More than 4.3 million households can already hope for the compensations promised by the government last year, which were determined after the sharp increase in electricity prices last year, in the coming weeks. In total, approximately 17 billion euros will be paid to these households, which were forced to pay an excessively high price for electricity for a long time, the newspaper reports. It should be reminded that initially the government had promised to start paying compensations as early as November 1 of last year, but the process of calculating them was delayed due to bureaucratic obstacles, which, of course, could not but anger the citizens.
