Should energy billing criteria evolve?
The current billing system has existed for about a century. It was designed to reflect a production chain essentially made up of “dispatched” plants, also known as “firm” ones. Notably the thermals.
In recent years, the world has seen an exponential growth of “non-firm” plants (sun and wind notably).
And so the cost structure of the electricity sector value chain has changed BUT the billing model has not. In my opinion, this “hiatus” creates a deformation. The main one is an incorrect appropriation of the costs incurred depending on the sources used.
While in the current model, the predominant cost of the bill is energy (kWh), in the new reality, it is demand (kW).
It is “just” a matter of reflecting a stated fact. In other words: today, the bulk of the cost actually incurred is the capacity made available to the consumer across the entire value chain (generation, transmission and distribution). It is an essentially fixed cost.
But… the power bills presented to customers are mostly variable!
If you would like to “dive” into this topic, I am available to explore the possibilities!
