In view of the increased procurement costs for electricity, Stadtwerke customers should be prepared for further price increases in the autumn. The elimination of the levy for renewable energies (EEG levy), which had temporarily reduced electricity prices slightly (by 3.72 cents per kilowatt hour), could not ultimately compensate for the increasingly expensive prices on the electricity market.

Customers of Rhineland-Palatinate's Energieversorgung Mittelrhein (evm) will also have to prepare for price increases for their basic supply very soon: From the first of August, the price of natural gas will increase by almost 86 percent to 14.90 cents per kilowatt hour. Electricity will then rise from 30.25 cents (as of June) to 35.90 cents per kilowatt hour. The elimination of the EEG surcharge is already included in this figure, says company spokesperson Christian Schröder. It now depends on current developments whether prices will continue to rise. Customers with special and fixed-term tariffs also have to be prepared for rising prices, especially in the gas sector.

Utilities such as Stadtwerke Troisdorf and Bad Honnef AG do not want to put an exact figure on the likely price increases, but expect an adjustment in autumn or winter. Reliable energy prices cannot be planned for the foreseeable future, says Daniela Paffhausen, spokesperson for Bad Honnef AG: "Energy prices on the markets sometimes fluctuate very strongly even on a daily basis."

Prices are also rising at the Euskirchen-based utility e-regio. Spokesperson Sebastian Zimer says that e-regio has bought its energy on a long-term basis, so that it can "cushion the extreme price jumps now to a certain extent". But the prices on the markets are now permanently at such a high level that this has to be passed on to the customers. For example, the price of natural gas for the basic supply will increase by 2.90 cents per kilowatt hour as of the first of September. The electricity price will increase by 5.34 cents per kilowatt hour compared to the current month. By the first of July, however, prices had also dropped slightly due to the elimination of the EEG surcharge. The suppliers agree that the end of the EEG surcharge did provide some short-term relief for their customers. But: "This cannot fully compensate for the enormous increase in procurement prices," says e-regio spokesman Zimer.

The current price jumps began even before the invasion of Ukraine. Last winter, many private consumers had to pay a lot more because the prices on the electricity markets had risen explosively. The background: the global economy was slowly recovering from the Coronavirus pandemic, so that companies were again demanding more energy. To make matters worse, many low-cost electricity suppliers terminated their customers' contracts because their business model no longer worked. The result: local basic suppliers suddenly had to take on many more customers, which put additional pressure on prices for consumers.

Rising gas prices continue to drive up electricity costs. This is because gas is not only used for heat, but also to generate electricity. Because a long winter and a partly very dry summer have led to less electricity being generated from renewable energies, natural and liquid gas are now increasingly needed for electricity generation. The Ukraine war is further exacerbating this problem: if less and less cheap Russian gas reaches Germany, electricity production with gas will become more expensive. It is true that Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck now wants to rely more on coal-fired power plants to generate electricity. But for now, prices are likely to continue to rise in the coming months.

Original text: Nina Bärschneider and Marie Schneider

Translation: Jean Lennox