The president of Iberdrola, Ignacio Sánchez Galán, has advocated for reducing the tax burden that the electricity bill bears, aligning with the recommendations of the European Commission and with the decisions already implemented in other European states, including the United Kingdom.
"The easiest and fastest way to reduce the price of electricity for the consumer is to eliminate the charges and taxes that are applied to it. Almost 50% of the electricity bill is related to taxes and charges, something infinitely higher than what fossil fuels bear," denounced Galán at a conference with analysts to present the results of the first half of the year.
In coherence with this approach, the highest official of Iberdrola highlighted the measure immediately adopted by the new British Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, who has decided to eliminate VAT on electricity for domestic consumers.
"It is key to have a reduction in taxes applicable to electricity, which is what they are going to do with VAT, so they are totally in line with our plans. We know their team very well and I believe we are going to work wonderfully well with him from this moment on and we can work very well as a distribution company in the Manchester area, where he has held the position of mayor in recent years," he pointed out.
Thus, Galán considered it "absolutely necessary" to review the tax scheme that weighs on electricity in order to advance in decarbonization, promote a "more robust, resilient, and higher quality" transport network available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and meet the objectives set by the European Union regarding energy transition.
After reporting a net profit of 4,336.4 million euros in the first half of the year, 21.7% more than in the same period of the previous year, and reaffirming the group's goals for 2026, which involve an increase of over 8% in adjusted net profit, he anticipated that, if the favorable dynamics observed in the second quarter continue, Iberdrola could "bring good news after the summer."
"Today we are already working to continue exceeding our forecasts for the coming years, thanks to the acceleration of organic investments in networks in the United States, as well as in the United Kingdom or Brazil, and also in generation, mainly in the United States, with additional improvements in efficiency and process improvements related to artificial intelligence," he said.
Purchase of Caruna and growth strategy
In relation to the integration of the Finnish Caruna, after announcing on Tuesday an agreement to acquire the main electricity distributor in the Nordic country in a deal that values 100% of the company at around 5 billion euros, including financial debt, Galán emphasized that it fits with the strategic line followed in previous acquisitions in markets such as the United Kingdom, the United States, or Brazil, acting as "long-term investors, industrial investors, not speculative investors."
"We see opportunities, opportunities that others do not see. As we have demonstrated, these opportunities allow us to materialize these operations. This is something that is already happening in places like the United Kingdom, where we have seen good results, also in the United States and in Brazil," he highlighted.
Despite this, he specified that it is a "relatively small" operation compared to the total investment volume of the group. "I believe we are investing almost 40,000 or 50,000 million a year and this represents less than 5,000 million, which I think is relatively small compared to the other operations," he estimated.