People's memories are short in Ireland so now is a good time to remind them that gas prices rise and fall but energy bills never get cheaper. This is a quote from an Irish Independent article from 2015 :
"Irish consumers pay the fourth-highest energy bills in Europe, according to EU statistics. Little of the large recent falls in wholesale gas and oil prices have been passed on to consumers".
The energy industry and politicians are now blaming high gas prices for the massive rise in electricity prices. In a properly functioning market, falls in wholesale prices would lead to lower bills. It has to work both ways. This clearly did not happen.
We had 11 years of low fossil fuel prices during which the price of electricity rose from 13.6 cents in 2012 to 29.4 in October 2021. It is therefore a lie to blame rising gas prices for the present rise in electricity prices.
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