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Several energy providers recently reduced the prices they pay for purchasing solar power. The remuneration also recently fell at the processing agency OeMAG, which purchases electricity at the market price. In addition, OeMAG has a new calculation formula, according to which electricity fed into the grid will be paid 8.137 cents per kilowatt hour (KWh) in January.
OeMAG published the average volume-weighted day-ahead hourly price on its website on Friday. This monthly value is an important criterion for calculating the feed-in tariff, but not the only one. The market price, which the regulatory authority E-Control always determines for the next quarter based on futures contracts, also plays a role. It marks the upper limit of the remuneration, but depending on the electricity prices on the spot market, the price that OeMAG pays can also fall to 60 percent of the market price determined by E-Control since the beginning of the year.
- also read: From 2024: Sales tax for photovoltaic systems will be canceled
8.137 cents in January
For the first quarter of 2024, the market price is 9.63 cents, which means that the remuneration for the months of January, February and March will be between 9.63 and 5.78 cents – in January it has now become 8.137 cents.
- more on the subject: Photovoltaics: Expansion stopped in seven regions in the country
The price that OeMAG will actually pay out has not yet been determined, because the so-called “aliquot balancing energy expenditure” still has to be deducted. These expenses are determined annually by E-Control based on the previous year’s values. In 2023 and 2022, the expenses were zero and therefore did not affect the market price to be paid. It will be clear by April at the latest whether this will also be the case this year.
“The days of making big money are over”
PV system owners are already preparing for significantly lower feed-in tariffs. “The days of making big money are over,” said a user in a Facebook group about photovoltaic systems in Austria at the beginning of January. But 7 cents is still a good price if you think about the time before the Ukraine war. Others, on the other hand, expect 5 to 6 cents and are already thinking about changing providers. It is also recommended to maximize your own consumption or look for an energy community.
The new calculation formula became necessary because the OeMAG remuneration was recently significantly higher than the actual value of PV electricity on the spot market. In some cases, the PV boom leads to electricity surpluses, especially on sunny days at lunchtime, which causes hourly electricity prices to fall and sometimes even turn negative. The market price, on the other hand, rose to up to 51.45 cents per kilowatt hour at the height of the energy crisis triggered by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As a result, OeMAG recorded a rush of PV system operators who switched to the processing agency with the feed-in in order to sell the electricity at a high price to the state processing agency. At the end of 2023, over 100,000 PV system operators had market price contracts with OeMAG.
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