Electricity bills – Minister announces new aid

The Minister of Environment and Energy, Kostas Skrekas, announced a new aid to households for the electricity bills, speaking on the MEGA weekend show.

He left open the possibility for aid measures extended to gas consumers.

“Right now we have received the bills based on last year’s consumption. The final bills (clearing accounts) that had arrived at the end of October do not yet have the state subsidy and the discount from PPC.

“These will be seen in the next clearing accounts, from December”, Mr. Skrekas explained.

Increasing the subsidy

“In the coming days we will announce an increase in the subsidy on electricity bills”

“We had budgeted a subsidy of 150 million euros and we said that every month we will come and see how the prices of electricity have fluctuated last month and we will increase the amount of the subsidy.

When we made the calculations in August, the wholesale price was around 100 euros per megawatt hour. Now it has exceeded 200 euros. We had a wide-ranging teleconference yesterday on how much extra money we need to spend to support increased household bills. The amount we have allocated to support household accounts should be increased.

In cooperation with the Ministry of Finance, we will decide in the coming days to increase the subsidy on household electricity bills. “The aid will be horizontal in all households, for all consumers”, he revealed.

“We will find the money to support the electricity bills from renewable energy sources”

“The subsidy from the stateUp to the first 300 kilowatt hours is . An average household, with average consumption, consume an average of 300 kilowatt hours per month. PPC increases the discount taking up to 600 kilowatt hours. We are strengthening, so that for the first 600 kilowatt hours households see a very small increase, of the order of 3-4 euros per month. We cover a large part of the increase. The latest ministerial decision allocates 470m euros for the last four months. We have a huge raging international energy crisis. We are finding the money to support the increased electricity bills from the profits of the special account that supports renewable energy sources,” he continued along the same issue.

The possibility for aid measures for gas consumers is open

“And as for gas, we will stand by households. We have increased the heating allowance so that those who consume gas are also beneficiaries. Last year we used about 80 million euros for heating allowance to support households. This year we have increased it to 180 million euros, and this together with the 15% discount that will be passed horizontally to all consumers, we believe will cover a large part of the increase. We are monitoring the increases in natural gas, and we will see if necessary from January onwards to take additional measures,” said Mr. Skrekas about natural gas.

The platform for the new “Save” scheme opens in November

Finally, speaking about the new “Save” energy upgrade scheme, Mr. Skrekas said that “An energy upgrade of a house can reduce energy consumption by up to 70%. We have removed the chronological hierarchy. We set criteria related to the cost of kilowatt hours saved, social criteria, and a number of other criteria, which will result in a transparent list. The guide has already been published on the website of the Ministry of Environment and Energy, and the platform will open in November.”