BASED on the European Commission’s energy prices and costs report released in mid-March, industrial electricity prices (excluding VAT and recoverable taxes) went up by about 3.5 percent per year in the period between 2008 and 2012. In some countries retail industrial prices have actually decreased over the period in question (the Czech Republic, Denmark, Croatia, Hungary, Ireland, the Netherlands, Romania, Slovenia and Slovakia), while industrial users in countries such as Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia have experienced annual growth of more than 8 percent.
Lívia Vašáková, an economic advisor at European Commission’ s representation in Bratislava, said at a seminar dedicated to the retail energy market that based on the report, Slovakia has the fifth highest electricity prices for industrial users within the EU and that these prices are among the highest in the world. For the EU as a whole, between 2008 and 2012 retail electricity prices rose for industrial consumers by 16.8 percent. For industry, the cost of charges related to the country’s Renewable Energy Act in particular increased more than fourfold, pushing up network costs, the report read.
