“What is born crooked, soon or never straightens.” The popular proverb was invoked by Nuno Ribeiro da Silva, an energy specialist and former president of Endesa Portugal, chosen by the Government to ‘straighten’ what was ‘born crooked’. Which, in this case, is the bidding model for the low voltage network to distribute electricity.
These concessions are distributed among 278 municipalities and are almost all exploited by the EDP group, through E-Redes. The concession period has already ended in the majority of these contracts, which have been extended due to the great difficulties in finding an agreed model to carry out a new tender.
This model is “extremely difficult to find,” acknowledged Nuno Ribeiro da Silva during the conference on renewable energies promoted by APREN (Portuguese Association of Renewable Energy Companies), especially because there are technical, economic and political aspects that influence its design. , which has had several versions. Ribeiro da Silva was appointed president of the Low Voltage Coordination Committee, a working group responsible for proposing new guidelines for the launch of the bidding process. This initiative by the Minister of the Environment, Maria da Graça Carvalho, already meant that the July 2025 deadline set by the previous Government would not be met.
Government prepares bases for competition for national electricity grid concessions
In statements to journalists on the sidelines of the conference, the manager clarified that it is the main interested party, the National Association of Municipalities (ANMP), that recognizes that the pre-electoral and electoral period is “a bad time” for the launch. The discussion “makes no sense” when the focus is on who will be the president of the House. Local elections are scheduled for September 25, 2025.
Despite another waiting period, the working group leader hopes to meet the deadline (December 15) to finalize the group’s proposals, which will highlight the difficulties involved in this process. In addition to the discussion of past models – and there have already been proposals to release a national lot, three or even eight lots – it is necessary to incorporate the new technical and capacity requirements of low voltage networks into the model in order to meet the objectives. of the energy transition, but also of the digital transition and cybersecurity.
During the APREN conference, the president of E-Redes, José Ferrari Careto, warned of the need for a significant increase in investment in low voltage networks, admitting that the next plan that the company will present contemplates an increase of 50% compared to a The values of the previous plan: the investment and development plan for the distribution network provided for more than 500 million euros in five years. In addition to responding to the enormous increase in consumption expected with the electrification of the economy, the new networks will have to respond to the demands of decentralized production, electric mobility and energy communities.
Nuno Ribeiro da Silva agrees that “we are talking about enormous investments” that represent a qualitative change in the electrical networks and, therefore, it may take more time than the 20 years of concession now planned to amortize this investment.
Ferrari Careto also warned of the risk of separating the low voltage operation (municipal concessions) from the medium voltage concession, two levels that are currently concentrated in the same company, E-Redes. This unique model in Europe allows the system to be much more efficient and the separation will bring new costs and will be less efficient, he warned.
Ribeiro da Silva recalls that in Spain it is the electricity companies that operate the low voltage networks and the concessions are for life. But in Portugal, these concessions are an important source of income for municipalities, collecting annual revenue that is then passed on to the rates consumers pay.
Guaranteeing that he will not waste any of the work already done in the past, the president of the commission, however, leaves the guarantee that it is unquestionable to maintain tariff unity throughout the territory. “It is a critical requirement” not to enter into the model used in water supply where each municipality decides what it charges, with great regional asymmetries.
Source: Observadora
