What the new decree says on electric energy consumption.
This new law reduces the chances of consumers at home to produce their own electricity from a renewable sources. The Government has finally approved the decree law regulating the consumption of electricity in Spain. Any consumer who wants to produce their own electricity at home with a solar panel must be aware of it. Several specialists have confirmed what they had forecast and pointed exactly to the stagnation of the renewable energy sector in this country.
How it affects us and what we can do about it.
To generate your own electricity at home with a solar panel is already more profitable than to buy from electrical companies: the price of solar panels has dropped more than 80% in recent years, while the price of the electricity bills has risen every year. However, the consumption of this renewable energy is not widespread in among Spanish households.
One of the main factors behind this contradiction in a sunny country like Spain is the lack of laws which could regulate and support the home production of renewable energy, something which it is agreed by all to be beneficial not only for the environment bur also for the economy.
The Spanish Government always ready to help.
Well, the actual Spanish Government always ready to help the people they wanted to through in their penny's worth so they propose in this new law that the penalty for failing to register a solar installation consumption can range from 6 to 60 million Euros. That is for starters!!
The recent approval of this malicious Royal Decree that regulates the consumption of electrical energy has been critically received from various experts in the field. This new law is full with measures against individuals who want to become self-sufficient in renewable energy and has been legislated at a time when the energy sector is being revolutionized worldwide. It is clear that the aim of this decree is to prevent the widespread in auto energy consumption, something that was foreseen when it was only a draft.
These statements are based on several major points of the Royal Decree which I explain below:
- It justifies the so-called "sun toll" or "sun tax". Consumers who have installed solar cell panels themselves have to pay a "toll" for each kilowatt/hour (kWh) which is consumed using his own installation. The decree states that this is to compensates for the support received from the national grid when the installation does not generate sufficient energy consumption and the user requires to obtain electricity from the national grid, but it is applied even to the energy that do not access the network. In practice is a double charge because the installation itself pays a fixed toll in terms of its power if it is connected to the network, and it is forced to pay again for the self-consumed energy, even if that energy does not has access to the network. In other words the more energy that it is generated on a home installation, the harder it is hit with taxes. I have to add that this tax is not applied anywhere in the world, as it is understood that the self generation of electricity benefits the national grid, by reducing its saturation, on the national energy system, by reducing energy dependence and by the reduction on greenhouse gases emissions.
- It impedes its installation by introducing complex administrative procedures. So that an installation that can be installed in two or three days, it requires nine months and hundreds of Euros to be authorized. Failure to comply, the penalties ranges from 6 to 60 million Euros my friends!!.
- Any surplus energy is Zero compensated. The consumer that produces more energy than it uses and is in the need to sale it to the electrical system it will be almost impossible, unless you become an entrepreneur and sell it in the electrical marketplace under the same rules as, for example, a nuclear power station. And there is more to come....
This saga will continue in my next article. I will analyse the disastrous implication of this misused decree.
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