The chair of the Commons Energy Security and Net Zero Committee has written to six energy suppliers – OVO, Octopus, E.On, Centrica, EDF UK and Scottish Power – to ask their views on the build-out and funding of new electricity infrastructure.
Bill Esterson MP said the committee had heard in evidence that non-commodity costs (currently a third of the bill) will continue to rise, outweighing any savings made in the wholesale cost of energy.
He said there was “general support for the energy transition”, and electricity use was likely to increase over the next 25 yeas. The cost of the necessary infrastructure has traditionally been levied through energy bills, and he asked the companies’ chief executives “whether you believe that this needs to change” and “there are other places we might find the money within the system”.
Responding to complaints about the burden of regulation, not least the number of data requests from Ofgem, he also asked “whether you have an estimate of how much regulation by Ofgem costs you, how much you think would be reasonable and how much that might save on the average bill”.