Rise in gas charges put off

The National Agency for Energy Regulation (ANRE) postponed taking a decision over SA Moldovagaz’s request to raise the natural gas charges until Monday, January 24, Info-Prim Neo reports Friday’s meeting was put off after over one hour and a half of debates that involved representatives of Moldovagaz. According to the calculations of ANRE, the charge for end-users may increase by 10.8%. The gas supplier demands that it be raised by 18.2%. Moldovagaz director Alexandr Gusev said the gas supplier was not informed about the calculation methodology used by the ANRE. “We did not know about this methodology. It wasn’t coordinated with us and we believe that they hide something,” Alexandr Gusev said. He also said that by Monday the company’s specialists will do their own calculations on the basis of the new methodology. It is not excluded that the charge will be lower than the one they asked initially. ANRE director general Victor Parlicov said that this new methodology was needed as the old one is outdated. “We will expect proposals from Moldovagaz until Monday,” he said. Moldovagaz requested increasing the charges after the import price of Russian gas on January 1 was increased from US$262.5 per 1.000 m3 in 2010 to US$293.8 per 1,000 m3.