At 9 a.m. today, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin signed the Russian Federation Government Resolution No. 877 of November 4, 2011, On Amendments to Certain Acts of the Russian Government to Improve Relations Between Suppliers and Consumers of Electric Power in the Retail Market.
In accordance with a mandate that Vladimir Putin issued prior to a meeting of the Government Presidium, the above resolution eliminates the standard practice of charging fines for arrears of electricity consumers who have contracts with a connected load of up to 750 kVA inclusive, as well as the procedure for payment differentiated by the number of hours of power consumption, as of April 1, 2012.
In addition, the resolution sets new standards for disclosure by wholesale and retail market participants, which provides transparency for all market participants in calculating the average unregulated prices of electric power, as well as harmonisation of calculations of the amount of power in the wholesale and retail electricity markets.
The full text of the Resolution has been published on the website of the Government of the Russian Federation.
The Prime Minister has also instructed Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin, Economic Development Minister Elvira Nabiullina, Energy Minister Sergei Shmatko, Russian Federal Tariff Service head Sergei Novikov, interested government authorities and organisations as well as the expert community to analyse the real economic performance of retail companies, and the economic feasibility of prices for different groups of consumers, and to submit proposals before December 20, 2011 in order to:
- clarify the implementation of Russian Federation Government Resolution No. 877 of November 4, 2011 (including draft contracts for the sale of electric power for industrial and commercial consumers)
- apply surcharge limits for distribution companies from a regional perspective
- reduce consumer debt and cross-subsidies of electricity prices.
The draft guidelines for the operation of retail electricity markets are to be submitted to the Government of the Russian Federation before March 20, 2012.