Text version
Everything as text
The same stops, steps and facts as in the experience, with the sources under each passage.
1. The bill: What are you paying for?
An electricity bill has four parts: the electricity itself, the grid, energy tax and VAT. How large is each, and how do they differ between a flat and a house heated with electricity?
Question: An ordinary household using 2,500–4,999 kilowatt-hours of electricity a year. How much of its electricity bill was the electricity itself in the second half of 2025? Answer: About a quarter: 76 öre of 299 per kilowatt-hour. The largest part was the grid, at 119 öre. Energy tax and VAT together came to 104 öre.
The grid is the tallest stack.
A household using 2,500–4,999 kilowatt-hours a year paid on average 299 öre per kilowatt-hour in the second half of 2025. 76 öre was the electricity itself, 119 öre the grid, 44 öre energy tax and 60 öre VAT. VAT is 25% and is charged on everything, including the energy tax.
More electricity, less grid per kilowatt-hour.
Households using at least 15,000 kilowatt-hours a year, for example in a house heated with electricity, paid 209 öre: 67 öre for the electricity, 57 for the grid, 44 in energy tax and 42 in VAT. The grid fee is largely fixed, so it shrinks per kilowatt-hour the more electricity you use. Those who use the least pay the most: below 1,000 kilowatt-hours a year the price was 635 öre per kilowatt-hour in the first half of 2026.
When electricity became the largest part.
In the second half of 2022 it looked different. The same ordinary household paid 380 öre per kilowatt-hour, and 176 öre of that was the electricity itself, nearly half. Outside the crisis years 2021–2023 the electricity itself has been the smallest part of the bill.
Good to know
In constant prices, electricity for a house heated with electricity has become 95% more expensive since 1996: from 104 to 203 öre per kilowatt-hour in 2025 money. The peak was 278 öre in 2022.
The energy tax on electricity was 9.7 öre per kilowatt-hour in 1996, 43.9 öre in 2025 and 36.0 öre in 2026. When the tax on nuclear power was removed after the 2016 energy agreement, the energy tax on electricity was raised to pay for it.
2. The turn: What happened in 2020?
Until 2019 all of Sweden had almost the same electricity price, and it was low. Then the country split into a cheap north and an expensive south. What happened?
Question: Before 2020 northern and southern Sweden had almost the same electricity price. How much more expensive was electricity in SE4, around Malmö, than in SE1, around Luleå, in the crisis year 2022? Answer: About two and a half times as much: 162 öre per kilowatt-hour as an annual average in SE4 against 63 in SE1. As recently as 2019 the gap was 2 öre.
One country, one price.
Sweden was split into four bidding zones in November 2011. Even so, the annual average price in SE4 was at most about 2 öre per kilowatt-hour above SE1 up to and including 2019. That year the spot price was 40 öre in the north and 42 öre in the south. In 2015 it was only 20 öre.
The south was pulled into the gas crisis.
Ringhals 2 closed at the end of 2019 and Ringhals 1 at the end of 2020. Both generation and the ability to move power south were lost. In 2021–2022 the gas price rose in Europe, and through the interconnectors it reached SE3 and SE4. At the same time water and wind were scarce, and in 2022 two large reactors stood still for long periods. SE4 averaged 162 öre for the year, SE1 63 öre.
The crisis passed, the gap stayed.
The gas price fell, but the gap between north and south remains. In 2025 the spot price was 18.5 öre in SE1 and 67 öre in SE4. The bottleneck in the transmission grid between north and south is still there, and the reactors in the south are gone. Meanwhile SE3 and SE4 stayed below the German price every year 2020–2025: in 2025 Germany had 99 öre.
Good to know
In winter 2026 the price rose across the country, in the north too. The variable price for a house heated with electricity in SE1 was 106 öre per kilowatt-hour in January and 113 öre in February. In October 2026 the government activated the high-cost protection for SE4.
3. Europe: Is Swedish electricity expensive?
It is often said that Swedish electricity is expensive. Compared with what? This is how an ordinary Swedish household compares with the rest of the EU.
Question: Counted in euros with all taxes: where did an ordinary Swedish household rank among the EU’s 27 countries in the second half of 2025? Answer: Tenth most expensive of 27: 27.1 euro cents per kilowatt-hour against the EU average of 29.0. In the first half of 2026 Sweden rose to sixth place, at 30.6 against 28.3.
Below the EU average.
In the second half of 2025 a Swedish household using 2,500–4,999 kilowatt-hours a year paid 27.1 euro cents per kilowatt-hour with all taxes. The EU average was 29.0, Denmark 33.1 and Germany 38.7. From 2015 to the first half of 2026 Sweden was below the EU average in 21 of 23 half-years. Adjusted for purchasing power, Sweden ranked 16th–26th of 27, in the cheaper half.
Sixth most expensive in the EU.
In the first half of 2026 the Swedish price rose to 30.6 euro cents against the EU average of 28.3. Sweden became the sixth most expensive of 27, the same rank as in the second half of 2021. Prices rose across Sweden that winter, in the north too.
Cheap electricity, expensive grid.
Splitting the 2025 price into its parts shows why the picture is mixed. The electricity itself cost 6.9 euro cents in Sweden against 12.5 in the EU, about half. The grid cost 10.7 against 8.2, about 31% above the EU average. Taxes including VAT were 9.4 against 8.3.
Good to know
Swedish industry had the lowest or second-lowest electricity price in the EU in most half-years 2012–2025. In the second half of 2025 it paid 8.5 euro cents per kilowatt-hour against the EU average of 16.0.
In Eurostat’s figures for 2022 the electricity support has already been deducted from Swedish prices, 5.8 euro cents per kilowatt-hour for an ordinary household. That makes the comparison with other countries harder for that year.
4. North and south: Where power is made and used
Sweden generates more electricity than it uses. But generation and use are in different places, and the transmission grid runs between them.
Question: How much of the electricity used in SE4, southern Sweden, was generated there in 2021? Answer: About a third, or just under: 7.1 terawatt-hours of 23.9. The rest came through the transmission grid from the north and through interconnectors from neighbouring countries.
Surplus in the north, deficit in the south.
SE1 and SE2 generated 77.6 terawatt-hours in 2021 but used 26.1. SE3 and SE4 generated 83.8 and used 109.8. Hydropower is in the north and nuclear power in SE3. Sweden as a whole generated more than it used.
The lines are not enough.
The transmission grid runs between the zones. At most it carries about 3,300 megawatts from SE1 to SE2, 7,300 from SE2 to SE3 and 5,600 from SE3 to SE4. When the lines are full, the price splits. In 2023 the Swedish National Audit Office called the state’s measures for the power system “reactive and poorly grounded”. Three transmission projects took 17–20 years, and Svenska kraftnät, the transmission system operator, missed its own investment forecast in every year 2012–2022.
The borders were drawn in 2011.
Before 2011 Svenska kraftnät handled the bottlenecks inside Sweden by cutting exports to neighbouring countries. After a complaint from the Danish power industry’s association, Svenska kraftnät offered to split Sweden into bidding zones, and the European Commission made that commitment binding in 2010. The Commission expected higher prices in the south. The government had already told Svenska kraftnät at the end of 2008 to start splitting the country.
Good to know
In a normal winter SE3 lacks about 5,200 megawatts in the hour when demand is highest, according to Svenska kraftnät’s forecast for 2025/26. At the winter peak on 12 January 2026 Sweden as a whole imported electricity.
Svenska kraftnät (2025): Kraftbalansen på den svenska elmarknaden (The power balance on the Swedish electricity market), autumn 2025 report (in Swedish) ↗Svenska kraftnät (2026): Kraftbalansen på den svenska elmarknaden (The power balance on the Swedish electricity market), spring 2026 report (in Swedish) ↗The EU’s 2025 review of the bidding zones found that none of four tested new divisions of Sweden increased overall welfare. Two variants with three zones would move 350–530 million euros a year from electricity customers to generators.
5. Nuclear power: What did the reactors matter?
Since 1999 six reactors have closed, four of them in 2017–2020. How much more expensive did that make electricity, and who decided?
Question: What mainly drove up the electricity price in southern Sweden in autumn 2021, according to the only model study? Answer: The gas price. With normal fuel prices the price in SE3 and SE4 would roughly have halved in the model. With Ringhals 1–2 running, and the transmission they supported, it would have been 30–45% lower.
Two decisions by the government, four by the owners.
Barsebäck 1 and 2 closed in 1999 and 2005 by decision of the government under the 1997 phase-out act, and the state compensated the owners. Oskarshamn 1–2 and Ringhals 1–2 closed after decisions by the owners’ boards in 2015, when the electricity price was low and the tax on nuclear power had just been raised. The largest owner of Ringhals is the state-owned Vattenfall. The energy minister told the Riksdag that Vattenfall had made the decision independently. The tax was removed from 2018, but the reactors still closed in 2019 and 2020.
The reactors would have cut the price in a gas-crisis autumn.
The only study to have modelled the question looked at autumn 2021. With Ringhals 1–2 running, and the transmission they were assumed to support, the average price in SE3 would have been 44 euros per megawatt-hour instead of 82, and in SE4 75 instead of 110. That is 30–45% lower. The study was done by a Danish consultancy for Energiforsk, which is owned by the energy industry and Svenska kraftnät.
The gas price weighed most.
The same study says prices were driven primarily by high prices for fossil fuels. With normal fuel prices, and no extra reactors, the price would have been about 35 euros in SE3 and 55 in SE4, roughly half. In an ordinary year Ringhals would lower the price by 25–35%, but by much less in kronor. No agency has calculated what the closures cost.
A reactor that stops is felt.
A working paper from the Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN) shows that when 1,000 megawatts of nuclear power dropped out unplanned in 2021–2024, the price in SE3 rose on average by 16.9 euros per megawatt-hour, about 28%. The uncertainty is large, 4.8–29.0 euros. Swedish electricity customers bore 42–53% of the cost and neighbouring countries the rest.
Good to know
Sweden’s reactors are owned jointly by several companies. A study in the Journal of Industrial Economics found signs that jointly owned reactors coordinated their maintenance after 2001. In the study’s own simulation a competitive price was only 3% below the actual one.
In the long run, a study from Chalmers University of Technology found that new reactors, once the old ones are retired, bring no or only a small cost advantage in a fossil-free power system in 2045.
6. The cables: Do exports make electricity dearer?
Sweden exports about a fifth of its electricity. Does that raise the price here, and who gains?
Question: If Sweden built a new 700-megawatt interconnector to Germany, how much would the electricity price here rise in 2035, according to a model study? Answer: About 1 euro per megawatt-hour, 0.97 in the model. Swedish electricity customers would lose 106 million euros a year and generators would gain more, so Sweden as a whole would gain 69 million.
Customers lose, generators gain more.
Researchers at the University of Cologne have modelled Hansa PowerBridge, a 700-megawatt interconnector to Germany that the government turned down in 2024. In 2035 the electricity price in Sweden would rise by 0.97 euros per megawatt-hour. Swedish electricity customers would lose 106 million euros a year and Swedish generators would gain 176 million, 77 million of it going to the state-owned Vattenfall. Sweden as a whole would gain 69 million.
The interconnectors brought in the gas crisis.
During the 2021–2022 crisis the link was clear. Researchers explain the price rise in SE3 and SE4 mainly by the energy crisis in Europe, which reached Sweden because the markets are coupled. Northern Sweden was shielded by the bottlenecks. In ordinary years southern Sweden is far below Germany: in 2025 the spot price was 67 öre per kilowatt-hour in SE4 and 99 in Germany.
Sweden may not throttle the interconnectors.
EU rules require at least 70% of the interconnectors’ capacity to be offered to the market. Throttled exports are exactly what led to the bidding zones in 2011. What Sweden can do is not build new interconnectors. The government turned down Hansa PowerBridge in June 2024, and in May 2026 Svenska kraftnät was told to remove three planned interconnectors.
Good to know
Sweden’s net exports of electricity were 33.7 terawatt-hours in 2025, about a fifth of its generation. From 2001 to 2010 Sweden was roughly in balance and in some years a net importer.
In 2012–2014 trade between the Nordic countries and Germany was limited, mostly because of bottlenecks inside Germany. The Energy Markets Inspectorate calculated that Swedish electricity customers gained 434 million euros from this and Swedish generators lost 481 million.
7. The grid: The largest item
The grid is the largest part of many households’ electricity bills, and no one can choose their grid company. How is the price set, and why has it risen?
Question: By how much did household grid fees rise on average from 2005 to 2026? Answer: 115%, counted in kronor. Prices in general rose 49% from 2005 to 2025.
More than twice as expensive.
The Energy Markets Inspectorate (Ei) has calculated that household grid fees rose on average by 115% from 2005 to 2026, counted in kronor. Consumer prices in general rose 49% from 2005 to 2025. In 2025 the grid cost about 31% more per kilowatt-hour in Sweden than the EU average.
The state-owned Vattenfall raised most.
Vattenfall Eldistribution raised its fees most, by 186%. E.ON raised them by 131% and other grid companies by 119% on average. In 2020–2024 the grid companies earned a return of about 9%, against about 6.5 for comparable European companies. Every year about 80 grid companies paid group contributions, in total about SEK 20 billion to other companies in the same group.
The companies won every time.
Ei sets a cap on how much each grid company may collect, with a rate of return that sets its profit. The companies have appealed, and the courts have raised the rate in all three completed periods: from 5.2 to 6.5% for 2012–2015, from 4.53 to 5.85 for 2016–2019 and from 2.16 to 3.39 for 2020–2023. According to the government’s terms of reference from 2026, customers probably cannot appeal, while the companies have nothing to lose by doing so.
Good to know
The cap on what grid companies may collect in 2024–2027 totals about SEK 326 billion. When it was decided, a head of department at the Energy Markets Inspectorate said the regulation overcompensates the grid companies relative to their actual costs.
The grid companies are also investing more: a planned SEK 30 billion or so a year in 2024–2027, against 23 billion in 2020–2023.
8. The money: Who got the money?
When the electricity price soared in 2022, customers in the south paid much more. Where did the money go?
Question: Who received the most money when the electricity price soared in 2022? Answer: The state. Svenska kraftnät, the state agency that runs the transmission grid, took in SEK 69.1 billion in congestion revenue in 2022, 48.6 billion of it on the borders inside Sweden. What generators earned per bidding zone has not been mapped.
The price difference went to the state.
When power flows from a cheap bidding zone to an expensive one, the price difference goes to the grid operator. For Svenska kraftnät this congestion revenue was SEK 0.7–2.3 billion a year in 2011–2019. In 2022 it was 69.1 billion, 48.6 of it from the borders inside Sweden. Energy tax on electricity brought the state 25.0 billion the same year, and Vattenfall paid a dividend of 23.4 billion. That dividend rested on two German one-off items, not on Swedish electricity prices.
The money gathers in one account.
From 2020 to 2025 Svenska kraftnät took in SEK 167.2 billion in congestion revenue: 8.2 billion in 2020, 21.5 billion in 2021 and 69.1 billion in 2022, then 19–29 billion a year. On top of that came 4.1 billion left from earlier years. The money does not go into the state budget. It is kept in an account of its own at Svenska kraftnät.
Half went out again.
Of the 171.3 billion, 86.0 has gone out. 43.7 billion became electricity support for households and businesses in 2022–2023, administration included. 17.9 billion lowered the fees for the transmission grid, 15.9 billion went to grid investment and 8.5 billion to counter-trade, losses and maintenance. One round of support went to households across the country, in the north too, where the bottlenecks had shielded them from the highest prices. The support for winter 2021/22, 8.9 billion, came from the state budget, not from the account.
SEK 85 billion is still there.
At the end of 2025, SEK 85.3 billion was left, against 4.1 billion at the end of 2019. The government calls the money a debt to electricity customers. 64.6 billion was placed with Riksgälden, the Swedish National Debt Office, which acts as the state’s internal bank. The interest there, 5.4 billion in 2022–2025, is not added to the account but becomes Svenska kraftnät’s own income. Svenska kraftnät has mostly used the rest for its own investments instead of borrowing.
The money may not lower the electricity price.
Under EU rules congestion revenue should first remove the bottlenecks and second lower the fees for the transmission grid. It cannot lower the price on the exchange. The electricity support of 2022–2023 rested on the EU’s temporary crisis rules, and that option ended on 1 January 2024. From 1 January 2027 Svenska kraftnät cuts its fees by just over SEK 8.3 billion, and households notice it through their grid companies. In August 2026 Svenska kraftnät was asked to propose how the money can benefit electricity customers sooner.
Good to know
The energy tax on electricity brought the state SEK 25–32 billion a year in 2018–2025. It was larger than Vattenfall’s dividend every year except 2022.
Anyone who has never chosen an electricity contract gets a default contract. In 2015–2021 such contracts cost on average 30–120% more than the Energy Markets Inspectorate’s benchmark, the average of the ten cheapest variable contracts. In December 2024, 7.8% of households had a default contract.
9. The levers: Who decides?
The electricity price is set in a market, but almost everything around it is a decision: taxes, grids, interconnectors, bidding zones and who may build. Who makes them, and who tries to influence them?
Question: Swedish parties report their donations to the Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency. How many named donations from power companies and energy industry organisations are in the reports for 2018–2025? Answer: None. In all 3,168 reports from the parties for 2018–2025, no power company, no energy industry organisation and no energy-intensive industry association is among the named donors. Donations below the threshold appear only as totals.
The levers are in many places.
The Riksdag sets the energy tax, the largest item Sweden controls on its own. Ei and the courts decide how much grid companies may collect. Svenska kraftnät builds the transmission grid, and the government licenses new interconnectors. The owners decided about the reactors in 2015. The bidding zones and the rules for trade between countries are set in the EU, and changing the bidding zones requires the countries concerned to agree.
Every side meets the Commission.
The EU Transparency Register shows how often organisations have met the Commission’s leadership since December 2014. The European wind power association has had 164 meetings, the power companies’ association 146, Fortum 96, E.ON 61, Vattenfall 45, Energiföretagen (the Swedish energy industry association) 15 and Naturskyddsföreningen (the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation) 10. Among the parties’ reported donations for 2018–2025 there is no named donation from the energy industry. No study has measured what lobbying means for the electricity price. From 1 July 2027 Sweden will have a lobbying register, but it does not cover contacts with agencies such as Ei and Svenska kraftnät.
The next rise may come in the north.
Svenska kraftnät expects Sweden to use 136 terawatt-hours of electricity in 2026 and 192–329 terawatt-hours in 2050, mostly for steel made with hydrogen in the north. Data centres could add more. In the simulations the price in SE1 rises from 28 euros per megawatt-hour to 55–81 euros in 2040. The government wants a single bidding zone in the long run, and Svenska kraftnät’s analysis is due on 29 January 2027.
Good to know
The state owns Vattenfall and since a Riksdag decision in 2010 has required the company to earn a market return. No instruction from the owner about electricity prices has been found.