Uniform network fees would not be an easy solution

East for uniform network fees

“Just as the motorway vignette and the postal and cell phone tariffs are the same in all federal states, it must also be possible to make the network tariffs uniform,” said SPÖ state manager Andreas Sucher just a few days ago. The Carinthian state government is committed to eliminating regional differences. The state currently charges the highest electricity network fees in the country at 11.77 cents per kilowatt hour. Also in Lower Austria and Wien There is resistance to the current regulation.

The System Usage Fees Ordinance determines how high the network fees are. The regional differences arise from how much is invested in the network. In some regions, especially in the east of Austria, networks are being expanded rapidly to accommodate the large number of new ones Solar and wind power plants to be able to connect. Zersiedelung also plays a role: the more lines are needed and the fewer electricity consumers there are in an area, the higher the costs. Investments in infrastructure also increase, among other things, if damage occurs Natural disasters need to be remedied.

Alignment would have explosive consequences

Relative low are the network fees in the West of the country, where the expansion of renewable energies is progressing rather slowly. A nationwide equalization of fees would result in an increase in costs. For Business locations With electricity costs so far attractive, this would be bad news, says Alfons Haber, CEO of the electricity regulator E-Control. If the tariffs are raised to a common level, it would have to be much more Compensation payments within Austria. Implementation would be very complex.

Alternative means of covering additional costs

“History thought something of it” when network fees were divided regionally at the start of the electricity market liberalization in 2001, says Haber. That power grid operators in some regions Expansion of renewable energies more heavily burdened could also be offset by measures other than a reduction in network fees. One possibility is Infrastructure Fundto finance network operators’ energy transition projects on favorable terms.

Basically, the whole issue is a matter for politics. According to Haber, there is currently no question as to which path is the right one lots of open discussions.