The Institut Luxembourgeois de Régulation (ILR) is encouraging consumers to be more interested in offers on the energy markets.

In September and November 2016, the ILR published several reports including one written for national and community authorities on activities in the sector of electricity and natural gas.

Among the documents published were two which give an overview of the most important figures in the electricity and natural gas markets in Luxembourg.

The report on the energy market indicates that 357 consumers changed energy provider in 2015. Whilst citizens are able to freely change their provider, since the energy market was opened to competition in 2007, the rate of provider changes is weak at only 0.1% in terms of numbers of customers.

In light of so few changes of providers, IRL reminds consumers that changing energy provider can reduce one’s energy bill by more than €45 per year, especially with new offers available in the market in 2016.

The IRL has also stated that energy production from renewable energy sources increased in 2015 by 10% and is currently at 430 GWh, thus making up 6.75% of the country’s electricity consumption. This rise is the result of the increase of compensation mechanisms and VAT in 2015 whilst energy prices decreased a lot compared to 2014.

The report on the natural gas market highlighted that the integration of the BeLux (Belgian-Luxembourgish) markets fits perfectly with European integration. The natural gas market has a volume of almost 20 million square metres per year thanks to this fusion of the two markets- alone, Luxembourg possess only 1 million square metres per year.

Moreover, the BeLux natural gas market is home to more than 70 active providers, thus creating an environment for more competitive prices for Luxembourgish consumers.

The document regarding the gas market also specified that the price of natural gas offered to residential customers dropped by 6% in 2015.

With the publication of these reports, the ILR aims to encourage consumers to become more active and inform themselves of the offers available. The ILR also reminds consumers that every citizen is free to choose their electricity and natural gas provider and that changing provider is easy and free to do.