Irish EU Commissioner Mairead McGuinness has warned that the era of cheap energy prices is over and we will never go back to lower prices.
The news will come as a bitter blow to households and businesses who are bracing themselves for escalating energy prices and massive bills throughout the coming winter months.
Ms McGuinness also said that the EU is still working on providing relief in our bills through windfall taxes on energy companies redirected back to consumers.
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This measure will raise an estimated €140billion across the EU, with Ireland in line to get up to €2.8billion of this.
However, in the meantime, Ms McGuinness said that she and her fellow EU chiefs are willing to ease the rules on State aid, meaning that the Government here could be free to provide more direct relief without fear of breaking strict EU laws.
The Commissioner was speaking in Dublin at an EU50 conference.
She said: “I think it’s very true to say that we are unlikely to go back to lower energy prices at all because since the weaponising of energy by Russia, it’s been remarkable that we’ve managed to source other energy suppliers, LNG, that we’ve managed to reduce our energy consumption.
“The piece that we need to work very hard on is investment in renewals, so, issues like planning permissions are very complicated across the Member states and of course the renewable supply chain has some problems as well.”
Ms McGuinness added: “What’s horrible for both households and businesses is that energy prices have just escalated and we’re trying to, through our State aid mechanism, countries can also provide support to households, targeted support and temporary support through the State aid regime.”
The Commissioner spoke to RTE’s Today with Clare Byrne where she said the EU had its countries well-prepared for the coming winter crisis.
Ms McGuinness said: “I think our preparations for this winter are good.
“But I think we’re now trying to plan for next year and beyond.
“So we’re still having a discussion around pricing and around what mechanism might be used to try and tame energy prices.
She explained some of the mechanisms that could be used, joint buying power and redirecting energy company profits.
“The recent meeting of ideas has moved forward on the idea of joint purchase.
“We know it’s companies that buy energy, not governments, but we are moving on how much we might collectively buy, to allow companies come together on the market, in other words, two buyers instead of 20 buyers will have more impact.
“We have talked about the fossil fuel sector and getting some of the profits and redistributing them around the Member states, equally around those energy companies that aren’t relying on fossil fuels and are making windfall profits.
“That is an accepted mechanism and that will allow a redistribution of profits that are very high in the energy market, to allow them to be redistributed in Member states.
“So, the idea that Member states are waiting for Europe to do something centrally, I think, is a misinterpretation.
“I think Europe is doing things collectively, including around those measures to redistribute profits within the energy system.”
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