The Utility Regulator has published the fourth in our series of Energy Retail Annual Reports. The report provides an overview of Northern Ireland’s electricity and gas sectors, and information on regulation, price controls and the work of the Regulator’s retail and social directorate. The data available includes renewable energy sources, customer numbers by supplier, gas and electricity consumption figures and customer switching figures.
Through the report we intend to deliver transparency for stakeholders and consumers. The report’s purpose is to provide readers with readily accessible information on our work and the energy sectors we regulate. It specifically focuses on the evolution and performance of Northern Ireland’s regulated retail energy markets - electricity and natural gas. With the arrival of energy supply competition at household level in 2010, transparency and information around the workings of our energy supply markets is more important than ever. As the number of participants to the market increase, this strengthens the need for transparency.
The report is structured in three sections:
Part one: Background. This part covers general aspects of Northern Ireland’s regulated energy sector. It gives a high level overview of how the energy sector functions, who the main companies are and the role of the Utility Regulator.
Part two: Core retail information. In this section we present information and data for those who are interested in Northern Ireland’s retail markets. The main information analysed are customer numbers, consumption, market shares, switching activity and prices.
Part three: Key retail work areas. This section provides a general overview of some key areas/projects we have progressed over the last year, or intend to progress within our retail and social directorate.
The Energy Retail Report is a live document. We intend to keep improving and adapting its content and coverage to the needs of our readers, and at the same time use it as a monitoring and information tool alongside our Quarterly Transparency Reports. We welcome comments and views from readers in terms of how the report might be improved and new data sets or sources that would be useful to add to future editions.
We are extremely grateful to stakeholders, particularly the regulated companies, who provided information for the report.