23/07/2025

Following the European Commission's decision of 24 April 2025 on State Aid, ERSE - Entidade Reguladora dos Serviços Energéticos (Energy Services Regulatory Authority) has approved ERSE Directive no. 6/2025, which sets the prices of Network Access tariffs, Network Access tariffs to be applied to self-consumption through the Public Service Electricity Grid, as well as the end-user tariff for supplementary supply of last resort, all applicable to customer installations with electro-intensive client status.

ERSE Directive no. 6/2025, which is awaiting publication in the Diário da República, thus makes the first amendment to Directive no. 2/2025, of 10 January, which approved the electricity tariffs and prices to be in force in 2025. The document on «Tariffs applicable to customer installations that obtain the status of electro-intensive client» (only available in Portuguese) explains the underlying calculations based on the tariffs approved in December 2024, taking into account the applicable legal framework.

The tariffs applicable to customer installations with electro-intensive client status were not published by ERSE in December 2024, at the time of the annual decision to approve tariffs for 2025, since this electricity levy reduction, which falls under the State Aid regime, had not yet been approved by the European Commission.

On 24 April 2025, the European Commission approved the electricity levy reduction for energy-intensive users in Portugal as part of the State Aid decision process. On the same date, Ministerial Order no. 112/2022 of 14 March, which regulates the status of electro-intensive clients, was amended by Ministerial Order no. 203 A/2025/1, namely establishing requirements for minimum thresholds in terms of average annual electricity consumption and the degree of electro-intensity. The conditions have thus been met for the publication of the prices of the Network Access tariffs and the end-user tariffs applicable to installations that have been granted electro-intensive client status.

The "Electro-intensive Client Status" was established in Decree-Law n.º 15/2022 of 14 January and can be applied to energy-intensive installations that are exposed to international trade and meet certain requirements.

Beneficiaries are entitled to a partial reduction in the payment of the levies called General Costs of Economic Interest (Custos de política energética, de sustentabilidade e de interesse económico geral ‘CIEG’), including reductions of 75 per cent or 85 per cent of the charges corresponding to the CIEG included in the Network Access tariffs. These reductions amount to 100 per cent for energy shared for self-consumption via the Public Service Electricity Network.