Green energy in Europe: What’s new in 2001?

green energy. between Refocus and www.greenprices.com. In each issue key information will be presented on green energy in Europe and abroad. In this issue some observations are made on green energy pricing and market developments in Europe up to the first quarter of 2001.

Green energy prices In countries with a regulated energy

market, such as The Netherlands, the

start of a new year usually includes the

publication of energy price updates. In

countries with liberalised energy mar-

kets, energy prices are updated through-

out the year and not necessarily on

January 1st. However, other reasons

such as tax increases may induce price

changes.

In The Netherlands, energy prices in

general rose substantially, for a large

part due to an increase of energy tax

(REB) from 5.6 cents to 15.92 Dutch

cents/kWh (6.93 Euro centslkwh) and

the increase of the VAT rate from

17.5% to 19%. Nevertheless, addition-

al costs for green energy decreased. At

present, in large parts of The

Netherlands, green energy is offered for

the same price as conventional electric-

ity, due to the energy tax exemption for

green energy.

In Germany, the energy tax (Okos-

teuer) has been raised by 0.5 Pfennig to 3

Pfennig/kWh (1.5 Eurocents/kWh) in

2001. German energy tax is due for both

conventional and green electricity. Despite

this increase, some of the suppliers kept

Table 1 Annual cost for green energy consumption in

three European countries, Euro/year*

their green energy prices constant. On the

other hand, more than half of German

green energy suppliers raised their prices

even more than the amount of the energy

tax increase.

In the United Kingdom, no substan-

tial price changes have been reported at

the beginning of 2001. In Finland,

another country with a liberalised ener-

gy market and green pricing schemes,

recent research shows that many

customers can actually save money by

buying green electricity, as most cus-

tomers have not yet changed to a cheap-

er company and the cheapest green

suppliers are cheaper than most of the

normal electricity suppliers’ standard

prices (source: Vaasaemg, November

2000).

In Table 1, total annual costs for green

energy are compared for Germany, The

Netherlands and Finland. It shows the

cheapest offers of green energy from

mixed renewable energy sources (solar,

wind, biomass and hydro).

If you have more money to spend and

prefer green energy from a specific

renewable energy source, you can choose

for example 100% wind energy in

Finland (annual costs resp. 76 and 189

Euro/year) and 100% solar energy

Germany (annual costs resp. 2033 and

4949 Euro/year).

Green energy market developments Preliminary figures show that roral green

energy consumption in The Netherlands

has increased to at least 695 GWh and

with more than 170 000 customers by the

end of 2000. These figures are expected to

change rapidly, as from April lst, 2001

the Dutch market for green energy will be

liberalised (although currently some dis-

cussion is going on as to whether or not

to postpone this date). Anticipating the

market liberalisation, new players recent-

ly entered the market, such as the green

energy supplier ‘Echte Energy’ (‘Real

energy’) being the first energy company

offering solely green energy, and a compa-

ny called Wisselstroom which concen-

trates on joining customers in order to

arrange price reductions by large scale

purchasing.

Opposite trends regarding the devel-

opment of the green energy market

come from Germany. Some green ener-

gy companies did well. Naturstrom AG

actually tripled its green energy sales

and Naturenergie AG reached break-

even one year sooner than expected.

Other suppliers did not succeed as yet

to reach their high expectations of three

years ago when the energy market

opened. Greenpreace energy currently

has only 6000 customers of the 70 000

envisaged, Unit energy recently men-

tioned in a press release that green

energy customers were far below

expectations.

Both Italy and France are currently

investigating the introduction of green

pricing schemes.

Furthermore, Belgium recently

announced its intentions to liberalise

the electricity market on July lst, 2003,

energy suppliers probably having intro-

duced green pricing schemes by then as

well.

Large users of green energy Non-domestic customers, such as compa-

nies, ask for green energy when it fits in

54 March 2001 RE wwwre-focusnet

GREEN ENERGY IN EUROPE

Greenprices is an independent

website covering green energy use in

Europe and abroad, with informa-

tion on suppliers of green energy,

their products and prices, policy

and news. Greenprices is an initia-

tive of Ecofys B.V. Currently

the following country sections are

online: Belgium, Germany, The

Netherlands, United Kingdom and

Sweden.

The address is wwwgreenprices.

corn, which is the general portal and

gives information on green energy in

the European Union. From here

you can visit the separate country sec-

tions for information on green energy.

For more information about

Greenprices or to suggest green

energy suppliers or large customers

currently not mentioned on the

website, please contact Heddeke

Heijnes, editor:

I?O. Box 8408,

NL-3503 RK, Utrecht,

The Netherlands,

tel. +3 1.30.2808300,

fax. +31.30.2808301 or send an email

to greenprices@greenprices.com.

Table 2: Top 10 Large users of green energy in Europe - National gnvemment, Provinces and TVlunicipalities

with their environmental policy. National

and local government or non-governmen-

tai organisations buy green energy to set

an example. Greenprices gives an

overview of such large customers of green

energy, for various categories. In this

issue: large users in Europe, in the cate-

gories ‘National government’, ‘Provinces

and ‘Municipalities’, February 2001

(Table 2).