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The Federation of Associations of Energy Utilities Companies (ACUE) warns that the significant deterioration of the financial situation of the energy suppliers and distributors represents a major risk for the entire energy sector, with major repercussions in the entire economy.
"Energy suppliers and distributors are putting in all the efforts to respond to the accelerate upward trend of acquisition prices on the wholesale energy markets, are implementing and pre-financing the package of measures made available by the authorities, for the 2021-2022 cold season. Still, the uncertainties generated by the legislative framework through ambiguous regulation, the introduction of additional costs in a discriminating manner, the uncertainty of recuperating completely and in time the sums provided by the legislation in force represent a major risk which will lead, shortly, to the significant deterioration of the financial situation of the large economic operators in the distribution and supply area," mentions a release of the ACUE sent, on Monday, to AGERPRES.
According to the quoted source, the provisions of Government Emergency Ordinance no. 3/2022 regarding the compensation schemes for electricity and natural gas consumption, had in view for implementation starting February 1 do not reflect the true costs of providers and will lead to immediate losses of the order of millions of RON, on average, for each provider, an unwanted situation which could generate a negative reaction in the entire energy sector.
Moreover, ACUE emphasizes that the measure of capping prices on the supply segment, disposed by Romanian authorities, does not respect the national legislation (Law no. 123/2012 on Energy with later amendments and additions - art. 80) and does not correctly enforce EU law. Given that the regulated tariffs in the composition of the final price differ depending on distribution operator, the measure also leads to differentiated treatment among suppliers, Agerpres.ro informs.
The ACUE Federation represents one of the most important groups in the electrical energy and natural gas domain, namely the companies CEZ Romania, E.ON Romania, Electrica SA, ENEL Romania, ENGIE Romania, Gaz Est, with a total number of over 24,000 employees and a turnover of over 5.5 billion euro. The total values of investments conducted by ACUE members in the 2005-2021 period exceeds 11 billion euro.
