VITALY KOROLEV: FAS BELIEVES THAT CRITERIA FOR LOCAL GRID OPERATORS MUST BE TIGHTENED

In FAS opinion, cases should be excluded when a network element is removed form a group of persons of companies, to eliminate expenses and shift them upon consumers

“The criteria of local grid operators (LGO) must be reviewed. We believe they should be tighten so that only these grid operators remain which are actually involved in their direct activity”, said Deputy Head of FAS Vitaly Korolev at the Collegium of the Tariff State Committee of the Tatarstan Republic.

“All grid operators that meet the LGO criteria must be rates according to the common principles and methods. The Tariff State Committee of the Tatarstan Republic must pay attention to the fact that today specific costs of the grid system per nominal equipment unit in the region are higher than those planned by us under the frame of network benchmarking”, informed Deputy Head of FAS.

Vitaly Korolev pointed out that the benchmarking mechanism is actively developing. It is already introduced in energy sale; currently a draft Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation on transferring the power grid to the benchmarking principle is under public discussion. The Decree is published on https://regulation.gov.ru/. All interested participants can submit their proposals that will definitely be considered.

“Regarding energy sale mark-up for the provider of last resort in Tatarstan, it is considerably lower that in Russia on average, which shows correct work of Tatarstan Tariff State Committee in this field”,  stated Deputy Head of FAS.

Another method that deserves attention is alternative boiler-house for formation heating energy costs. As mentioned by Vitaly Korolev, that are already two examples in Siberia that work.

“Perhaps, if there is a need, Tatarstan authorities should consider this method and develop a project on implementing it in the region. This mechanism accumulates the balance of interest between the heat supplier and consumers”, clarified Deputy Head of FAS.

Vitaly Korolev positively assessed the efforts Tatarstan Tariff State Committee, explaining that “it is very active, initiative and substantive proposals are offered under the frame of devising regulatory acts”.

“Also, it is necessary to draw attention to the fact that last year FAS did not abolish any decision of Tatarstan tariff body. It is a very good performance indicator since the Antimonopoly Service closely supervises the tariff legitimacy in the regions”, emphasized Deputy Head of FAS.

Finally, Vitaly Korolev invited representatives of all stakeholders to take part in a hands-on workshop “Tariff regulation in the context of digital transformation”, on 5-6 March in Sochi.