Energy Market & Energy Statistics

Aenert news. Energy Market & Energy Statistics

The Eurostat has published data on electricity prices in the first half of 2023 compared to the first half of 2022 in the European Union (EU) and a number of other countries such as Iceland, Norway, Montenegro, Albania, Serbia, Turkey, Georgia and Ukraine, etc.

In general, compared to the first half of 2022, household electricity prices increased in the first half of 2023 in the majority of the EU Member States.

The most notable price increase was for residents of the Netherlands, where prices rose sharply (953%), followed by Lithuania (87.8%) and Romania (77.3%).

Five EU Member States were exceptions to the general trend, recording a decrease in residential electricity prices. The largest price drop was recorded in Spain (-41 %), which was due to the easing of measures to reduce taxes, charges and fees. In addition, Denmark, Portugal, Malta and Luxembourg also belonged to the lucky five, with the latter rather fixing the 2022 price remaining unchanged.

Comparing the final price that consumers pay for electricity, there are quite strong discrepancies. For Dutch households, the price per kWh was 64% higher than the EU average price and totaled €0.4750. As the graph below shows, Belgium (€0.4350 per kWh), Romania (€0.4199) and Germany (€0.4125) are also in the group of countries with high residential electricity prices. By contrast, households in Bulgaria (€0.1137 per KWh), Hungary (€0.1161) and Malta (€0.1256) paid half as much as the EU average.

Eurostat also presented the evolution of electricity prices for residential consumers in the EU since 2008, taking into account different taxes and inflation rates. According to the report, the electricity price excluding taxes developed until the first half of 2021 very close to the general inflation rate. After a sharp increase in both semesters of 2022, there was a slight decrease in the price of electricity in the first half of 2023, which however increased further in the first half of 2023 reaching the highest recorded price of EUR 0.2890 per kWh, indicating that the increase in electricity prices was higher than the general inflation rate.

The average price in the EU in the first half of 2023 for non-household consumers was €0.2095 per kWh. The highest prices for non-domestic consumers were in Romania (€0.3289 per kWh) and Hungary (€0.3030), while the lowest were observed in Finland (€0.0950) and Portugal (€0.0954).

By the Editorial Board