UK Energy bosses post £483 billion profits since energy crisis began

DECEMBER 28, 2024

Just 20 energy companies have made a staggering £483 billion in profits since the start of the energy bills crisis.

While the full range of figures for 2024 have yet to be declared, profits this year amount to £9bn, with another £77bn of interims also declared.

Recent Ofgem price cap changes have seen energy bills creep upwards with a further 1.2% increase due to come into force from 1st January 2025.

Simon Francis, coordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, commented: “While consumers have suffered in cold damp homes this winter, energy firms’ boardrooms have been celebrating further bumper profits. To add insult to injury, around a quarter of what is spent on heating our draughty properties is wasted, because the fact is that the UK has some of the worst insulated homes in Europe. Fuel poor households are seeing money fly out of their windows and into the pockets of the energy industry.

“We are repeatedly told that there is not enough money to provide support for older people with their energy or to roll out comprehensive programmes of insulation. These figures show this is simply not true. There is plenty of money in the energy industry, it’s just not in the hands of hard-pressed customers.”

The staggering sums are revealed in the End Fuel Poverty Coalition’s updated profit tracker which examines profits made by a sample of companies that include energy producers (such as Equinor and Shell) through to the firms that control our energy grid (such as National Grid, UK Power Networks and National Gas Transmission) as well as suppliers (such as British Gas). It does not include supply chains or market trading firms.

As recently as October, changes in the price cap meant that suppliers will be able to make an additional 11% in profits on every standard variable tariff. Analysis of these figures suggest that supplier profits allowed through the price cap could amount to around £1.2 billion over the next 12 months, enough to cover the cost of Winter Fuel Payments for almost all pensioners.

A March 2024 Warm This Winter Tariff Watch report also called for improvements in transparency of the ownership of energy firms after it found that British households had been boosting the profits of Chinese and Qatari Government-backed funds as the cost of the gas network has surged 38%.

Warm This Winter spokesperson Caroline Simpson said: “We reckon it’s about time the energy industry stopped lining their own pockets and supported the estimated 8.8 million people that have spent Christmas in cold damp homes.”

The group is campaigning for a comprehensive insulation programme as the quickest and easiest way to bring down bills permanently: in real terms the average household is paying more than £750 extra to use similar levels of energy as a few winters ago. The latest forecast price cap rise means energy bills will be 70% above what they were in winter 2020/2.

Simon Francis said: “That’s why the Chancellor needs to fully fund the Warm Homes Plan in the Comprehensive Spending Review. Anything less than the £13.2bn promised during the election campaign will simply not be good enough.”

Image: https://pix4free.org/photo/2475/energy.html Credit: Pix4Free.org Energy by Nick Youngson CC BY-SA 3.0 Pix4free Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported CC BY-SA 3.0 Deed