National Agency for Regulation of Energy to consider draft on cutting gas rates in near future

Chisinau,26 January /MOLDPRES/-The Administrative Board of the National Energy Regulatory Agency (ANRE) will hold a meeting to decide on a draft concerning the decrease of gas rates in the near future, according to a communiqué by the regulatory authority.

The meeting will be convened following consideration of arguments provided by representatives of enterprises and calculations made by ANRE. The regulatory authority's press service noted that the participants in the concerned meeting  "will debate assessments by experts consulted by ANRE, so that the decision should be as objective as possible”.

The current situation in the gas sector was discussed at a meeting of ANRE’s Administrative Board with representatives of enterprises within Moldovagaz company. In particular, the participants in the meeting approached issues regarding the full transfer of gas supply activity from 11 distribution companies to Moldovagaz, investments made and planned in the gas system, tariff deviations accumulated by enterprises from the Moldovagaz system in 2010-2015.

They also discussed recalculation of gas tariffs as a result of amending the law on gas, which led to significant drop in transportation price, included in the tariff, and the subsequent amendments to the methodology of calculating and applying the regulated gas rates.

The tariffs for gas supplied to residents might be cut by at least 10 per cent. Prime Minister Pavel Filip and the Moldovagaz company’s administration reached a conclusion to this effect at a meeting last week. 

The ANRE’s Administrative Board in mid-November 2015 approved a decision to increase the gas rates by 9.8 per cent against the ones approved in September 2011. The parliament on 20 December had unanimously adopted a draft on amendment of the law on natural gas, under which an amendment to the concerned law was cancelled, which entered into force in August 2014. This amendment triggered a 16-fold increase in the tariff for gas transportation. Afterwards, ANRE informed that the tariff for end consumers might be decreased by five per cent.  

Moldova was buying gas from Gazprom for 204 dollars per 1,000 cubic meters in the fourth quarter of 2015 against 311 dollars in the first quarter of the same year, according to data by Moldovagaz. Deputy Prime Minister, Economics Minister Octavian Calmic said the price for gas imported by Moldova would be lower in 2016 against 2015.

(Reporter V. Bercu, editor M. Jantovan)