Kainų teisinio reguliavimo aktualijos Lietuvos elektros energijos rinkoje

Abstract

Liberalization of the electricity market caused the origination of new legal methods of the regulation of prices in the electricity energy sector. These new methods of prices’ legal regulation have to deal with completely new social relationships, which are spreading in the competitive electricity market. The auctions and exchanges of electricity have originated. The electricity generators and suppliers are trading electricity and the prices of electricity are settled by the forces of the market. However the transmission and distribution of electricity are monopolistic activities, therefore the prices of the services of electricity’s transportation are regulated by the state. The goal of the article is to reveal the changes and the goals of the legal regulation of the prices of electricity and of the services, which are related to the supply of electricity, in competitive and interrelated electricity markets. The goal of the article was achieved after the fulfillment of the following task: the legal regulation of prices of electricity generation was analyzed; the peculiarities of legal regulation of prices of electricity transportation were revealed; the principles of the prices’ legal regulation in the retail market were determined. The article consists of introduction, three parts, which are devoted to analyze of prices’ regulation, and conclusions. In the first part of the article the problems of the legal regulation in electricity generation sector are discussed, also the European Union and Lithuanian legal acts, which regulate prices in electricity generation sector, are analyzed. The made analyses leads to the conclusion, that the high concentration of electricity generation market, but not the dysfunction of legal regulation, is the main obstacle for competition in electricity wholesale market.