The Government has decided to include in the order that regulates the tolls and gas to 2019 the remuneration paid to Enagás for the maintenance of the underground storage of gas Castor. These rights of recovery include both the bill 2019 (8.7 million euros) as the 2017 and 2018 for the same amount), which Enagás has not gained in his time because they were paralysed by the National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC) following a ruling by the Constitutional Court.
MORE INFORMATION
The Supreme undertakes to return 18 million that Enagás charged for expenses of Castor, The Government compensates with 1.350 million to ACS by the store Castor
The Constitutional Court declared the end of 2017 unconstitutional and null several articles that made reference to these costs in the way that the previous Government ordered that they be paid. The Executive of Mariano Rajoy approved a royal decree-law in 2014 in the that established both compensation to the owner of the store Castor (1.350 million euros) and the payment to Enagás for maintaining the failed installation gas. The Constitutional did not consider that he had made through a decree-law, because it was not a situation of “extraordinary and urgent need”.
After that ruling, Enagás has not gained the bill of the years 2017 and 2018, so now the Government include such compensation in the order which establishes the tolls and canons of the gas system to 2019. There are a total of 26.1 million euros and include a 5% “profit margin”. And it does, according to the draft of the order, the Ministry of Ecological Transition has submitted today to public consultation, “in order to avoid the abandonment uncontrolled installation”.
The store of gas Castor is kept in hibernation from which, in 2013, during the testing phase, it will cause a series of earthquakes during its filling that was forced to close it for safety. The Government considers it “imperative to provide the company responsible for the management of the facility by the economic means necessary for its supervision, operation and control to ensure the safety of the installation for people and the environment”, says the draft of the order. Sources of Enagas argue that the amounts paid correspond only to security tasks: helicopter, boat, which monitors the environment, seismographs…
Tolls frozen
The proposal of ministerial order Gobahis remains frozen, the tolls of the gas system, that have not been modified since 2014. It is, therefore, the sixth year in a row that will freeze the tolls from natural gas, so that the part regulated in the bill, the only one that depends on the Executive, returns to remain constant. The tolls are the amounts that are charged for the use of the infrastructure and the cost of energy.
The proposal of order for the next year will be subject to public consultation until the 17th of December. The final order is usually published in the official state gazette during the last days of the year. The proposed values “have a provisional basis” until the CNMC to develop the calculation methodology, recalls the Executive.
Despite the fact that the minister for the Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, confirmed in an interview with Five Days that the National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC) would set the tolls electric and gas from next January, has not given time to the Government to return this competition to the regulator. It is expected that the Council of Ministers will soon –but not this Friday, as it was being announced– the return to the CNMC of these competencies, among others, that the previous Executive was appropriated.
bank debt of Castor is not listed
The proposed order does not include a point that the previous yes included: the payment of the annuity corresponding 1,350 million, which valued the investment of the Beaver and that has been paying to the creditor banks up to the judgement of the Constitutional Court. The order published at the end of 2017 was recognized, in virtue of royal decree-law 13/2014, the payment of 80 million euros “to the holders of the right of collection by the gas system”.
These receivables are currently in the hands of the Banco Santander, Bankia and CaixaBank, which this past April filed a complaint for the State to give them back what they send ahead. After the judgment of the Constitutional of the end of last year, the National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC), in charge of channelling the return of the advance by the banks, left to compel the payment of that bill annual 80 million through the gas bill.
The Supreme Court ordered a few weeks ago, Enagás to return the 18 million euros that took in the receipt in 2015 in concept of maintenance of the store Castor. In the judgment resolved the complaint raised by the employers ‘ association Cecot, which he considered unconstitutional, the Royal decree-law for which he is recognized these payments to the failed installation gas. This amount has not yet been refunded. Cecot has appealed also to the remuneration of 2016.
