Electricity producers are obliged to pay for the use of the transmission system, and Elektroprivreda (EPCG) should pay these costs, and not for consumers to do it for them, said the Chairman of the Board of the Energy Regulatory Agency (RAE), Branislav Prelević.
In an interview with the Mina-business agency, Prelevic assessed that it is unnatural for domestic consumers to pay the Montenegrin Electric Transmission System (CGES) part of the cost incurred by EPCG.
"Our decision from December last year, by which we determined that electricity producers also pay for the use of the transmission system, for example, has been contested before our courts five times. According to that decision, the electricity producer who uses the transmission system is obliged to pay for that service to CGES. You're probably wondering what's strange about that. Before that decision was made, only consumers paid for the use of the transmission network, but not producers," explained Prelevic.
As he added, the regulator had several circumstances in mind when making that decision.
"First, European regulators have changed the paradigmatic principle that the consumer pays everything to the principle that the user pays. It is unnatural, to put it mildly, that domestic consumers pay CGES the part of the cost incurred by EPCG," Prelevic said.
In addition, as he announced, by reducing energy consumption in the Aluminum Plant (KAP), EPCG opens up the possibility of significant export of electricity.
"On this export, thanks to the good management of hydropower plants and good monitoring of the market, EPCG makes a significant profit," said Prelevic.
That, as he assessed, is great news.
"We would all like them to earn more than that, but it is their turn to pay the costs of using the transmission network, and not for consumers to pay for it," said Prelevic.
All the more, as he said, he is surprised by EPCG's persistent persistence to challenge the regulator's decision.
"During all the time of disputing this decision of ours, since the beginning of this year, EPCG has not paid CGES a single cent of its obligations, which for this and the next year amount to about 15 million euros, and thus not only does not respect the laws of this country, but also calls into question the reliability of the entire system, because CGES cannot function normally without these funds," Prelevic believes.
The installation of smart meters showed a reduction in unauthorized consumption
The installation of smart meters, he said, shows a reduction in unauthorized consumption and better billing.
"However, no meters or technical measure can seriously stop this phenomenon if we as a society do not have a consensus on this problem and do not call the so-called unauthorized consumption by its real name, i.e. theft, and those who did it thieves. The damage suffered by EPCG on this basis is unbearably great ", assessed Prelevic.
When it comes to the price of electricity and its growth in the past period, Prelevic announced that in July 2012, the RAE, with its decisions on approving the regulatory permitted income for energy companies for the period until the following year, determined an increase in the price of electricity for households on average of about six percent per year.
"However, with the corrections that followed in August last year and this year, based on the determination of the difference between the approved and realized energy and financial quantities, RAE corrected the electricity prices for households for the second and third years. In this way, instead of the projected price increase for the period from 2012 to the following year of about 18 percent, there was an increase in prices of about nine percent," specified Prelevic.
The price of electricity for households with value added tax (VAT) in Montenegro is currently ten cents per kilowatt hour (kWh), while the EU average is 20,47 cents per kWh, that is, more than twice as cheap.
"The argument that our purchasing power is weaker than Europe's does not mean much here, because electricity is a stock commodity, so it cannot be adjusted to the purchasing power of consumers. Even if we include that parameter in the analysis of our prices, then we take the level of our wages as it is "If this had been done in some research, we would have received information that the price of electricity is at the level of the European average," Prelevic said.
Projections about the future movement of electricity prices at a general level, as he stated, are always ungrateful.
According to Prelević, stable tariffs are expected in the short term in the coming year, unless there are some major disturbances.
"Then we would be forced to react with corrections," Prelevic said.
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