Regulator approves the natural gas storage tariff values for 2019/2020

On 14 December, the Council of the Public Utilities Commission (Regulator) approved the application of natural gas storage tariffs presented by JSC “Conexus Baltic Grid” (Conexus) to Inčukalns Underground Gas storage cycle 2019/2020 and the long-term tariff of storage. It prescribes new storage tariff values and two-years value of capacity product.  This decision applies directly to the sellers of natural gas, so the influence on the users of natural gas is going to be so big as much the sellers include the new storage tariffs in the invoices of end-users.

Charge for natural gas storage makes only a small part in the total payment of end-users for gas, so there shouldn’t be substantial changes in the payments of end-users. The new storage product tariffs shall have effect on households from 1 January 2019.

When compared with the previous Inčuklans underground gas storage cycle, new two-years capacity product (long-term) is anticipated in the new cycle in addition to the present products (grouped capacity product (GCP), market product (MP) and virtual flow product).

The maximum value of grouped capacity product tariff applicable to storage cycle 2019/2020 is set to 3,52056 EUR/MWh, the minimum value of market product value applicable to storage cycle 2019/2020 is set to 1,38000 EUR/MWh, the value of two-years grouped capacity product tariff for the combined storage cycle 2019/2020 and 2020/2021 is 4,90056 EUR/MWh.

The approved tariffs become effective as of 15 January 2019. It means that natural gas sellers can start reserving the natural gas from 15 January 2019, but injection – from the beginning of injection season.

When calculating the tariff values, it is planned that the forecasted used capacity of storage during the storage cycle 2019/2020 is 14 872 000 MWh, that corresponds to the average natural gas volume of three years. This exceeds the forecasted natural gas capacity for storage cycle 2018/2019 included in the tariff calculation in April 2018 by 10,8%.

Tariffs you can see HERE.