Household consumers’ bills for natural gas will drop to 0.23 and 0.25 lei per kWh in the coming period, well below the ceiling of 0.31 lei per kWh, said Laurențiu Urluescu, president of the Romanian Association of Energy Suppliers (AFEER).

“For natural gas, the domestic consumer has a ceiling of 0.31 lei per kWh. Since May last year, consumer bills have fallen well below the ceiling, they were 0.27 – 0.28 lei per kWh. Now, since April, we expect an even bigger drop. I’m expecting rates between 0.23 and 0.25 lei per kWh. It seems that the exit from the capping scheme is going smoothly,”  said Laurențiu Urluescu, quoted by Agerpres.

He mentioned that there are several categories of ceilings in terms of electricity.

“If we refer to the ceiling of 1.3 lei per kWh, where there are non-household consumers and those who have a somewhat higher consumption, we believe that the exit from the capping scheme will proceed relatively smoothly. In the household segment, at the moment , there are seven offers with a price below 1.3 lei – and we expect the number of offers to increase. As for the other two household ceilings, respectively 0.8 lei and 0.68 lei kWh, things are a little more delicate there, because the ceiling of 0.68 lei for some areas in the country does not even cover all the taxes, tariffs and other obligations that the supplier collects just to pass them on supply at 0.68 lei and for 0.8 lei the price of energy should be somewhere at 50 lei per MWh, which is unlikely to happen. I am sure that the schemes related to the vulnerable consumer will be developed after the capping period expires in March next year,” Laurențiu Urluescu also said.