Czech minister Havlíček wants to use EU funds for energy grid investments

Industry and Trade Minister Karel Havlíček (ANO) wants to make greater use of money from European funds for investments in the development and reinforcement of domestic energy grids, in particular the Modernisation Fund and the EU's SAFE defence programme. He said Czechia could draw tens to hundreds of billions of koruna in this way. He aims to limit the impact of the investments on the regulated component of energy prices. Havlíček said this in an interview with ČTK.

The final energy prices paid by consumers consist of a commercial and a regulated component. The commercial part is set by suppliers, while the regulated component is set by the state through the Energy Regulatory Office (ERÚ). The regulated component of energy prices primarily includes transmission and distribution charges.

The government of Prime Minister Andrej Babiš (ANO) decided in December that the state would take over all financing of supported energy sources (POZE), which include renewable and secondary energy sources, next year. This will newly burden the 2026 state budget by an additional roughly CZK 17 billion, with the state spending more than CZK 41 billion on the charges in total. Until now, POZE financing had been shared between the state and consumers. The aim of the change was to reduce regulated electricity prices, which have thus fallen by 15 percent year on year for households this year.