Electricity bills are set to rise in the coming years because the company responsible for the country's high-voltage distribution network Elia is to make major investments. Elia will be allowed to pass on the cost of the investments in the transmission tariffs it charges. An average customer will see their monthly bill increase by between two and three euro. The new transmission tariffs have been approved by the federal energy regulator CREG.
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Electricity bills set to rise to pay for major investments by grid management company
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Elia operates the high-voltage electricity distribution grid in Belgium. Elia is allowed to pass on any increase in its costs to the consumers provided that these are deemed to be justified by the federal energy regulator CREG.
As a result of the cost of the planned investment Elia has been granted permission to increase its tariffs by 77%. This will mean that the average domestic customer will pay 2 or 3 euro/month more for their electricity.
Elia to adapt high-voltage grid to cope with rising demand
Elia submitted proposals with regard to electricity transmission tariffs for the period from 2024 to 2027. This has now been given the green light by CREG. During this period Elia will carried out a lot of work on and considerable investments in the country’s high voltage grid.
With the increasing demand for electricity due to, for example heat pumps and electric cars, electricity consumption is set to increase by 50% between now and 2030.
Elia will therefore invest billions over the next few years in, among other things, the new Ventilus project in West Flanders and the Boucle-du-Hainaut high-voltage lines in Wallonia.
Increase will noticeable from 2025
Between 2024 and 2027 Elia will invest 6.4 billion euro in the high voltage grid. This is more than four times as much as what it has invested during the past three year. The extra investment means that Elia’s costs will increase and now CREG has given the green light it can increase its tariffs by an average of 77% during the forthcoming three years. The largest increases will be from 2025.
CREG stresses that the tariff increase that it has approved is 10% lower than Elia’s original proposal. Transmission costs currently account for around 3% of the total amount consumers pay for their electricity or around 40 euro/year for the average consumer.
Elia is keen to stress that investments will be beneficial to consumers and estimates that the economic added value that they will bring to be between 750 million and 1.2 billion euro.