As natural gas prices continue to rise, energy prices in Europe are rising all the way, so much so that european countries have seen buildings stop lighting up at night, billboards have been closed, department stores and retail chains and even elevators have been temporarily stopped to save electricity. But one thing, that is, everyone tacitly accepts the high price of electricity, after all, in order to support Ukraine, the EU and Russia are directly opposed, and the latter causes the price to take off directly by cutting off or reducing energy supply. However, there are still countries that cannot tolerate the price of electricity and the price of natural gas, and on September 2, the Swedish government called for the decoupling of natural gas prices from the electricity pricing system, believing that this move will reduce the price of electricity.
So the question is, why can't the Swedes stand the high electricity prices in Europe? Can Sweden really decouple electricity prices from natural gas prices?
(1) Why can't the Swedes stand the high electricity prices in Europe?
As we all know, most countries in Europe will use natural gas to generate electricity for heating, so the price of electricity is often linked to natural gas, which is the common sense that many Europeans can accept, so Swedes can accept high-priced natural gas, why can't they accept high-priced electricity? The answer is simple, because the cost of electricity in Sweden is much lower than the average cost of electricity in Europe, that is, as a net exporter of electricity, people not only cannot enjoy cheap electricity, but even have to find other countries to buy electricity, just as Chinese universities send their own school teachers to South Korea to study Chinese.
But the reality is so outrageous, although Sweden is Europe's net electricity exporter, but because Sweden's power generation mainly relies on green energy, such as solar energy, but Sweden has a big problem, that is, the dimension is too high, so the lack of sunlight in winter, in the darkest months, the sunshine time in southern Sweden is only half of Munich, Germany. This means that Sweden's green energy supply is unstable, after all, the premise of solar power generation is to have sunlight, so without sunlight, there is no solar energy. So Sweden's electrical energy is cyclical, so Sweden will encounter occasional lack of power generation capacity. In addition to this, grid congestion has forced southern Sweden to sometimes need to import electricity. But the Swedes know very well that Sweden is a big exporter of electricity. As a large exporter of electric energy, Sweden's electricity price is so high that it is undoubtedly a kind of robbery, so Sweden is very dissatisfied with the high price of electricity.
So why is the price of electricity in Sweden, a major electricity exporter, so high? The reason is actually not complicated, simply put, that is, the ghost of the "market economy" is at work, although the cost of electricity in Sweden is low, but the average cost of electricity in Europe is high, so it leads to a high average price of electricity in Europe. And Sweden's power company is also to make money, so it can naturally sell at a high price, will not sell at a low price, if the Swedes do not accept the average high electricity price in Europe, then Sweden's electricity is more naturally not accustomed to this group of users, but will choose to sell to other places, so that Swedes must accept the average high electricity price in Europe in order to use electricity. In such a situation, Swedish Prime Minister Anderson expressed his dissatisfaction with the high electricity price, and Anderson said that the Swedish government will require the price of electricity in the European energy market to be decoupled from the price of natural gas, which has been unreasonably high.
(2) Can Sweden really decouple electricity prices from natural gas prices?
So if the Swedes want to decouple the price of natural gas from the price of electricity, why not take the initiative to do so? As a country that joined the European Union in 1995, Sweden must abide by the explicit rules and unspoken rules of the European Union, and cannot make its own claims, otherwise it will be picked up and beaten by the European Union. In the European Union, the price of electricity market is often directly linked to the price of natural gas, once Sweden chooses to control the price of electricity, it is to give priority to its own national electricity, rather than equal treatment, it is already a kind of trade protection, which seriously challenges the authority of the EU. If Sweden can easily change its rules without the consent of the EU central government, what is the difference between that and Brexit in disguise? What is even more frightening is that if Sweden's trade protection move is established, and other EU countries once again follow suit, each engaging in trade protection in its own advantageous or inferior region, then what is the point of the EU?
(3) Conclusion
But then again, the fundamental reason why Sweden is reluctant to keep the price of electricity and natural gas in sync is because the EU cannot get enough natural gas, coal and electricity now, so that each member country must rely on itself to find energy, and the EU central government is simply a decoration, so the Swedish prime minister will come out to challenge the EU marketization. If the EU is unable to solve the energy supply problem in the future, then trade protection within the EU is bound to be inevitable.