Electricity purchasing pools

The purpose of gas purchasing pools is to aggregate the purchasing power of gas consumers in industry and the distribution and service sectors, to enable them to obtain lower prices.

Since liberalisation attractive offers have emerged for household and industrial consumers, and many new products have been developed for these segments. However, this trend has largely by-passed the mid-market — small and medium-sized industrial companies.

The aim of gas purchasing pools is to pool consumers' purchasing power, to enable them to obtain lower prices and trade in the gas market at low cost. Pools can negotiate different types of prices. These could be

 
  • Multi-year, fixed price contracts: these lock in the prices paid by business customers for the term of the contract and shield them from increases in wholesale prices. However, the benefits of any long-term wholesale price reductions are not enjoyed until a new supply contract is signed.
  • Flexible purchasing: staged purchasing mitigates price risk without sacrificing the chance of profiting from falling prices; the pool member decides on the precise trade-off.

Apart from creating opportunities for savings through strategic gas purchasing, pools can help members save energy.

Further information is available from several gas purchasing pools, a list of which can be found on our German pages.