European households are paying more than ever for electricity and natural gas, even despite governments spending billions of dollars to protect consumers from the energy crisis.
Source. Bloomberg.
Details. According to energy consultancy VaasaETT Ltd, the average retail gas price across the European Union and Great Britain was almost 18 euro cents ($0.18) per kilowatt-hour in October, double what it was in the same month last year.
Household electricity costs have soared by 67% to 36 euro cents per kilowatt-hour.
The figures come as EU governments have pledged more than €550 billion to protect citizens and businesses from soaring energy costs over the past year. Had countries not provided such support, household bills would likely have been even higher, said Philip Lewis, chief executive of the Helsinki-based consultancy.
The average unit rate for electricity rose by 3.4% in October, while that for gas increased by 2.5%. The biggest monthly gains were in the Irish capital Dublin, where power rates rose by 44%, while the average gas price in Rome soared by 97%.
Unseasonably warm weather came as a relief for both consumers and governments in October, as fewer people turned on the heating. However, prices are set to increase as Europe heads deeper into winter, which could create future problems for political leaders who have tried to keep costs artificially low.
“If we were essentially to have the crisis for another whole year, the cost of those measures for these governments would be enormous,” Lewis said in an interview. “Eventually customers will forget that those prices are not real prices – they will take them as the norm and then it becomes essentially impossible to remove them.”