Energy companies are obliged to bill with more detailed and transparent information and the reduction of gas is extended until the end of 2023

Central heating aid for communities: conditions to request them and discounts

MADRID, 18 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Government will finance through the General State Budgets (PGE) the deficit generated by the limits on the increase in the natural gas bill for the new Last Resort Rate (TUR) for neighborhood savings for community boilers, as well as by the extension of the current conditions for domestic consumers of TUR 1 and TUR 2 to limit the increase in their gas bills by 5%, which will be in force in both cases until the end of 2023.

The Council of Ministers has approved this Tuesday a Royal Decree-law of aid that will mobilize 3,000 million euros from the PGE to reduce the energy bill of 40% of households in the country due to the impact of the crisis.

At a press conference after the Council of Ministers, the third vice president of the Government and minister for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, Teresa Ribera, highlighted that this Royal Decree-law represents the tenth package adopted by the Executive since June 2021 to protect families and the industrial fabric, accelerate the transformation of the energy system and react to the crisis caused by Russia.

He also stressed that this new package of measures, which he insisted introduces new "temporary and extraordinary" rates for consumers in the current context of the energy crisis, affects a total of 18 of the 73 included in the contingency plan approved by the last week to deal with this autumn/winter, which makes a total of 29 measures "already activated".

In the specific case of the reduction for community heating bills, this extension of the protection scheme for the Last Resort Rate (TUR) for natural gas to a new TUR for neighborhood savings will benefit 1.7 million households and expected to represent a 50% savings on the bill.

This new TUR, which actually includes a total of eight different ones depending on consumption, will, however, require consumers who benefit from it to have individual meters installed before September 30, 2023, as well as to have their boilers reviewed.

In addition, only 100% of the equivalent to the consumption of the last five years will be subject to the discount, while if more than the average of those last five years is consumed, the increase in consumption pays the TUR4 plus 25%, with the objective to encourage efficient consumption by communities of owners.

"It is a saving that we estimate at 40%. We calculate the average consumption of that community in the last 5 years, and to 70% of that consumption we apply a discount of 40%; 30% would continue to pay for gas at the price that is on the market. If the community increased its consumption above the average consumption, there would be a penalty," Ribera said.

Regarding the ceiling established by the Executive that prevented for TUR1 and TUR2 - those of domestic consumers of natural gas - that the natural gas component rose more than 15% in each quarterly review of the TUR, which meant limiting the rise in the receipt to a maximum of around 5%, is also extended until December 31, 2023, when it expired this coming March.

Thus, as indicated in sources from the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, the deficit generated by these measures as of next November will be assumed by the PGE.

However, the accumulated deficit due to the limitation that was in force in the case of TUR1 and 2 since it was adopted in October 2021 until the end of this month must be returned as planned, with the payment of the difference by each consumer when the period of validity of the measure expires.

In addition, the Government limits the possible penalty to terminate natural gas contracts, also including the immediate termination of possible related service contracts.

Likewise, the measures to relax natural gas contracts for industry and the reduction of extraordinary income due to the effect of natural gas, which were approved in September 2021, are extended until December 2023.

In this way, the reduction of gas that the Government launched more than a year ago to revert part of the extraordinary profits obtained by generating companies to consumers, will remain in force until at least the end of 2023.

Subsequently, in March this measure was reinforced by extending its application also to fixed-price term contracted energy with a hedging price greater than 67 euros/MWh; In the case of hedges between companies of the same business group, the final market price will be taken into account.

Together with these measures, the new approved package, which complements the contingency plan, called the More Energy Security Plan, which the Government launched last week, reinforces the social bonds -electric and thermal-, which families can take advantage of vulnerable or numerous.

Thus, new discounts of 40% are included in the electricity bill for 1.5 million low-income working households and the current social bonus, which is covered by 1.3 million households, is reinforced.

Families with several members (two adults and two minors) whose joint income amounts to almost 28,000 euros, as well as those who live alone and earn just over 16,000 euros. It also covers two people who live together and earn 19,320 euros between them, two adults and a child who together 23,520 euros or a family of several members whose joint income stays around those 28,000 euros.

More flexibility is also given to consumers, allowing the self-employed and companies to make modifications to the contracted power with greater flexibility than the current one until December 31, 2023.

Likewise, the discount for vulnerable consumers is increased from 60% to 65%, that for severely vulnerable consumers will be raised from 70% to 80%, and the amount of energy entitled to these discounts will be increased by 15%.

Likewise, the aid of the thermal social bond is increased, which grows from the range of 35 euros to 350 euros per year -depending on the climatic zone of the beneficiary- up to the range of 40 euros to 375 euros per year, thus doubling its budget allocation.

Another important front for the Government is transparency in information on energy bills. In this sense, the Executive will oblige to include in the receipts information on the average consumption of consumers in the same postal code, as well as to provide detailed information (standardized nomenclature and transparency on the average adjustment price) on the contribution of the Iberian mechanism that It has been applied since last June to cap the price of gas for electricity generation.

Sources from the Ministry indicated that they anticipate that these changes in the energy bill may already be included as of next December and stressed that they are motivated, among other reasons, by the fact that it has been detected in recent months that some marketers are making explicit the Iberian mechanism in a way that can lead to confusion, when it is a measure that in net terms has a positive effect for the consumer and that has saved around 3,000 million euros since its application.