Branislava Milekić, chief executive officer of the Power Utility of the Republic of Srpska (Elektroprivreda Republike Srpske – Matično preduzeće AD Trebinje), said the electricity price increase for companies will be less than 12% and that the tariffs will depend on transmission line quality, daily Nezavisne novine’s portal reported.
Regulation authority REERS (Regulatorna komisija za energetiku Republike Srpske) published new tariffs on June 11. The average price for households will rise 9.4% in July to BAM 0.14 (6.99 euro cents) per kWh, while the increase across the board will be 8.76% to 6.49 cents, according to the document.
After meeting representatives of the monopoly and the business community, regulatory commission member Ljubo Glamočić said utilities asked for a BAM 53 million (EUR 27.08 million) increase in yearly revenue in the Republic of Srpska, one of two entities of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Nevertheless, the regulators approved an increase of just EUR 17.88 million, he added. From the total sum, the most is for production facilities (three hydropower and two thermal power plants).
The chamber of commerce and employers’ representatives said the announced 10% to 12% increase in power prices isn’t acceptable. The power utility’s activities still need to be rationalised and economic policy plan was to introduce reforms aiming at helping businesses, but the charge for using renewable energy sources was instead increased, they said.
Meanwhile, Hidroelektrane na Trebišnjici, a hydropower plant operator, filed a report to Banja Luka Stock Exchange on June 15 that shows a gap in revenue of EUR 39.34 million from last year, mostly debt by legal entities, buyers of electricity, magazine Istina’s portal reported. The Power Utility of the Republic of Srpska owed EUR 34.74 million to the subsidiary, equivalent to its yearly production.
