Electricity prices rose last month as the Israel-Hamas conflict drove up fossil fuel costs, new figures show.
Industry lobbyist Wind Energy Ireland calculates that wholesale electricity prices averaged €125.52 a mega watt hour (MWh), the unit in which it is sold, in October.
That was 12 per cent higher than September, an increase driven partly by a hike in oil and gas prices that followed the Hamas incursion into Israel which sparked the current conflict.
Wind Energy Ireland maintains that wholesale electricity prices hit €170.79 MWh on days when the country relied almost solely on fossil fuel to generate power.
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However, the organisation says they slid as low as €101.66 on days when weather allowed wind farms to contribute most to electricity supplies.
Irish wholesale electricity prices, at which generators sell power to companies that supply homes and businesses, vary widely every hour, depending on demand.
Wind Energy Ireland’s figures show that families and employers continue to pay far higher rates for electricity than wholesale rates.
Homes and small businesses pay more than 40 cent a kilowatt hour (KWh), the unit in which electricity is sold to most customers, while the average wholesale price quoted by Wind Energy Ireland equates to 12.5 cent.
System charges push this closer to 20 cent, but it remains far below domestic rates.
This is because suppliers hedge the electricity that they sell to most customers, so they buy it months and possible up to two years in advance.
Consequently suppliers bought most of the electricity that homes and businesses now use at high prices that resulted from other crises, including the Ukraine war.
Noel Cunniffe, Wind Energy Ireland chief executive, noted that the price of natural gas, used to generate around half Irish electricity needs, tends to increase in the final three months of the year.
“Electricity generated from Irish wind energy replaces those fossil fuels,” he added.
