Cost of Living: Energy boss gives warning that higher bills are here to stay because fossil fuel transition

The warning comes as energy bills continue to rise around the country
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The boss of Norwegian energy firm Equinor has warned that high energy bills are here to stay. This will be due to the transition from fossil fuel to cleaner energy sources.

Rising energy bills have impacted people across the country over the winter. Household energy bills increased by 54% in April 2022.

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This was due to increase by a further 80% in October 2022 but, according to the UK Government, this was limited to a 27% increase. This was as a result of the Energy Price Guarantee but despite this, energy bills are set to rise by a further 20% in April 2023.

Speaking to the BBC, Anders Opedal said: "This will require a lot of investment and these investments need to be paid for, so I would assume that the energy bills may slightly be higher than in the past but not as volatile and high as we have today".

Giving an outlook towards the future, he said: "We need to treat energy as something that is not abundant. I think we have had a lot of cheaper energy in the past and we probably wasted some of it, so we need to make sure we’re making the right investments now [and] everyone [should] use as little energy as possible."

Equinor is an energy company which is focused around being involved in a low carbon future. Their projects revolve around oil and gas, renewables and low-carbon solutions, with an ambition of becoming a net-zero energy company by 2050.

The company is one of the biggest in Europe. It has operations in 36 countries across the country.

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