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Gas flame on a stove: Rising energy prices
Photo: Angelika Warmuth / picture alliance / dpa
Energy costs have been exploding for months, massive price increases for electricity and gas are causing problems for customers all over Germany.
A comparison with the previous year now shows the full extent of the problem.
Anyone who chooses a new electricity tariff in January pays an average of 12.5 percent more than the average for 2021. The average of the electricity tariffs currently available for household customers with an annual consumption of 3500 kilowatt hours is 36.19 cents per kilowatt hour, according to the Federal Association of Energy and Water Industries (BDEW).
For comparison: in 2021 the average was 32.16 cents, in 2020 it was 31.81 cents.
Gas prices are rising even more
Anyone who is currently signing up for a new gas tariff pays an average of 12.21 cents per kilowatt hour for an annual consumption of 20,000 kilowatt hours, which is a full 72.9 percent more than the average for 2021. At that time the average was 7.06 cents, in 2020 it was 5.97 Cent.
Almost half of all apartments in Germany are heated with gas.
The industry association gave higher procurement costs as the reason for the increases in electricity and gas.
For example, prices on the futures market for electricity, on which suppliers buy electricity over the long term, rose by more than 300 percent between January and December 2021 due to increasing energy demand.
On the futures market for gas, prices even more than quintupled during this period.
"These extreme price increases on the electricity exchanges must be taken into account by the energy suppliers in their price calculations," said the chairwoman of the BDEW executive board, Kerstin Andreae - and called for the state to relieve the burden on households.
In particular, the tax and levy burden on energy must be reduced.
rai/dpa
