Vice President of the Energy Forum: vain hopes for lower current prices. Freezing prices for recipients is a waste of public money
You should not count on the fact that energy bills will be much lower. Even if wholesale energy prices fall, thanks to the development of cheap renewable sources, system and distribution costs, balanced and modernization and expansion of the network, will rise at the same time – says Tobiasz Adamczewski, vice president of the Energy Forum.
In the Energy Forum report – “Anatomy of high energy prices and a prescription for the future” we read that the average prices of electricity in the European Union belong to the highest in the world, why is this happening? What conclusions did Europe draw from the energy crisis?
The main reason for high prices is the continent's structural dependence on the import of fossil fuels. In 2023, as much as 68% of the EU demand for energy was covered with imports. Such a relationship makes our economy extremely sensitive to geopolitical crises, which clearly showed a hosty increase in prices after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The average price of energy, especially in the entire EU, is a very inaccurate indicator. With the development of renewable sources and energy storage, those recipients who will be able to adapt the consumption to the energy supply or produce it will have cheaper.
The energy crisis was a brutal verification of the current policy. We drew a fundamental conclusion from it: building safety and price stability requires becoming independent of imported fuels. Energy transformation based on its own renewable energy sources has ceased to be perceived only as an atmospheric goal, and has become a key element of the EU security and economic competitiveness strategy. In response, the European Commission presented, among others The strategy of pure industrial order, which aims to reduce energy costs by developing renewable energy, integration of markets and increase the flexibility of the system.
In Poland, unlike other countries, e.g. Germany, the price of energy for industry is one of the most expensive in the Union, although prices for households remain relatively low. What's more, in our country, energy prices for households are frozen, and the energy consuming industry receives subsidies. Does this mean that it will only be more expensive?
This disproportion is the result of a conscious political decision, not natural market mechanisms. Freezing prices for individual recipients is an emergency effect, which masks the real costs of the system's functioning and, as we indicate in the report, It is a waste of public money because it supports the richest to the greatest extentwho consume the most energy. As for the future of prices – you should not count on the fact that energy bills will be much lower. Even if wholesale energy prices fall due to the development of cheap renewable sources, at the same time system and distribution costs, balanced and modernization and expansion of the network, will increase. Therefore, the key is the question of how to manage the cost structure so that they are rationally distributed between various groups of recipients. Instead of freezing prices, which is socially unfair, we need system solutions such as a targeted energy voucher for the poorest and support for investments in energy efficiency.
The report reads that the Polish system is characterized by low flexibility. What does this mean in practice?
Low flexibility is one of the biggest problems of the Polish energy system. In practice, this means that our system cannot effectively respond to changes in production and energy demand.
When we have a lot of sun and wind, we produce cheap renewable energy energy. However, due to the lack of flexibility – i.e., e.g. energy storage or flexible reception – we are not able to fully use or store this energy. As a result, there is a paradox: we must limit (so -called edit) production from cheap, zero -emission renewable energy sources. This phenomenon is growing rapidly – in 2022 it was 8 GWh, and by May 2025 around 574 GWH of disconnected energy.
At the same time, to ensure system stability, we must use old, expensive and inefficient coal power plants that cannot quickly adapt to the work of other sources. So we pay twice: once, wasting cheap energy from renewable energy, and a second time, paying for maintaining expensive conventional units. This is the practical dimension of lack of flexibility.
In December 2025, the last auction within the power market is to take place – i.e. a support mechanism that is to contract power for 2030. As part of this system, over PLN 100 billion was received mainly by large coal units. What will happen after this time?
The current power market model is actually ending and requires fundamental reform. Keeping it in the current form, which supported mainly the inactive carbon power plants, in the era of the growing renewable energy participation would be to deepen the problems.
After 2025, Poland must implement a new, reformed mechanism that will support not only power, but above all flexibility. In the “Power and flexibility” report, we recommend the introduction of a two -production power market. This means organizing two separate types of auctions. The first of them would contract the disposal power – for units that can work stable for a long time, when it does not blow and shine (e.g. gas, water power plants, heat warehouses). The second auction would support flexible power – it would be intended for services and units that can react very quickly to changes in the system, balancing renewable energy fluctuations (e.g. battery magazines, DSR, gas engines).
Such a division would allow to support exactly those abilities that the system needs and accelerate the construction of modern, flexible power replacing coal. Without this reform, we are threatened with a growing power gap and higher costs of maintaining the security of supply.
Let's talk about the “amount of sugar in sugar”, i.e. how much energy price is in our electricity accounts? Few of us can understand the bill that energy companies send us …
Our household accounting analysis for 2025 shows that electricity itself is less than half of the final amount – exactly 43%, of which 11 percentage points are the cost of CO2 emissions. The rest is a distribution cost (37%), i.e. energy transmission costs with networks as well as taxes and fees (23%in total), including 19%VAT and a number of other fees, such as the power, cogeneration or renewable energy fee.
This shows how the account structure is complex and why the simple focusing only on the price of the energy itself is misleading. Improving the transparency of accounts is one of the key steps that we recommend so that citizens can understand what they really pay for.
This year, the power installed solar power has exceeded 22 GW and despite the weaker dynamics, this sector of renewable energy sources is constantly developing. RES energy is cheaper than that of coal, but the most competitive price is energy from land windmills. However, prospects for her are not the best, because President Elek, to put it mildly, is not her supporter and the windmill act prepared is unlikely to be signed. At what time horizon can energy prices fall in Poland and what reforms should be implemented to make it happen?
Economic modeling shows that, the development of wind farms is a key way to structural reduction of wholesale energy prices in Poland, even taking into account the costs of balancing renewable energy variables. In addition to accepting the so -called We are still waiting for the windmill act for the government of the national plan in the field of energy and climate, i.e. in fact an investment plan that should counteract high energy prices.
At the same time, there are also a number of changes that could reduce energy costs for end consumers, such as: restoring the stock exchange bond for electricity trading, reduction of the costs of creating direct lines in industry, replacement of frostning prices with energy vouchers for the most needy support, accelerating thermomodernization of buildings.
Talked to Michał Niewiadomski
