The measure to cap the price of gas in the wholesale electricity market takes shape and detail. The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has estimated that the average price of gas will reach 48.8 euros per megawatt hour during the twelve months that the proposal is in force, which seeks to reduce consumer bills by 30%. It would benefit both families and businesses.
The decision will be approved tomorrow at an extraordinary Council of Ministers, Sánchez confirmed during a conference on European funds organized by eldiario.es, where he explained the “significance” of the proposal. From the outset, the price of gas “will have a cap of 40 euros, compared to 72 euros yesterday or 80 last quarter”, which means “half”, the president remarked. Then it will climb to close at the average of 48.8 euros that the president has detailed today, a figure that was established at 50 euros until now.
In his opinion, in this mechanism that will also be applied in Portugal, the protection and predictive factor linked to future increases in a scenario of uncertainty and volatility is “important”, and represents “another example of the close collaboration of the two governments “. The head of the Executive boasted that “Iberism suits Europe and the European construction, and we are going to demonstrate it both in Lisbon and in Madrid”.
The cap will benefit consumers who are referenced to the electricity wholesale market price. It accounts for 40% of domestic consumers and almost 80% of industrial consumers.
With the approval this Friday, the gas cap would come into operation almost a month and a half after its announcement and more than 15 days after the initial intention of the Spanish Government, which expected to have it operational at the beginning of May, as announced by the vice president and Minister for the Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, on March 26, when Brussels gave political support to the measure.
In the midst of prices that remain soaring, the urgency of applying the reduction to consumers’ electricity bills led both countries to confirm on Monday that they had received authorization from Brussels to do so, when what they had received was an evaluation preliminary.
In his speech, the president reviewed the objectives and milestones of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan and boasted that Spain “is the leader in executing the plan, far behind the rest of the countries” of the European Union, highlighting that “no turbulence It is going to divert us from the task of transformation thanks to European funds”.
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