Electricity and gas rates will increase, and the energy bill burden for a four-person household is expected to increase by approximately 7,400 won per month.

The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy announced on the 16th that electricity rates will increase by 8 won per kWh and gas rates will increase by 1.04 won per MJ.

This means that when assuming that a four-person household uses 332 kWh of electricity per month, the monthly electricity bill this year will increase by approximately KRW 3,000, and when assuming that a four-person household uses 3,861 MJ of gas per month, the monthly gas bill will increase by approximately KRW 4,400.

Meanwhile, there is an opinion that this increase is insufficient to resolve the deficits of KEPCO, gas companies, etc., and that additional increases may be made.

In the case of KEPCO, the accumulated deficit amounts to 38.5 trillion won, and an additional 6.2 trillion won was accumulated in the first quarter of this year alone.

Recently, Korea Electric Power Corporation, Korea Gas Corporation, etc. have come up with self-rescue measures, but it is difficult to say that they can resolve the accumulated deficit in terms of numbers.

In addition, there is still a high possibility of additional energy rate increases in the second half due to risk factors such as the OPEC+ audit and global gas price fluctuations.