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Mexican households pay more for electricity than private companies like Walmart.
This is because there are still subsidy contracts with companies for self-supply.
If the companies produced their energy using sustainable options, the government had to give them a subsidy.
Through Twitter, Martí Batres, Secretary of the Government of Mexico City (CDMX) accused an electrical “injustice”, since Mexican households subsidize foreign companies that use the free electricity network or charge the Federal Electric Commission (CFE) for electricity. With this, he asserted that while a Mexican household pays 5.2 pesos per kilowatt; Walmart pays 1.7 pesos per kilowatt.
A household pays 5.2 pesos per kilowatt; Walmart pays 1.7 pesos per kilowatt. Households subsidize foreign companies that use the transmission network for free or charge the CFE for electricity not delivered. That injustice must be corrected.#ElectricReformOfThePeople
– Martí Batres (@martibatres) April 17, 2022
Everything is ready for the vote on the Electricity Reform. From this Sunday morning the discussion of the “Bartlett Law” began in the Chamber of Deputies and between shouts, flags and cheers it was determined that the quorum to carry out the session was reached, with 488 deputies present.
Walmart subsidized and pay less for the amount of electricity you consume
The Walmart Inc. corporation currently has three divisions: Sam’s Club, Walmart International and Walmart US and the last one is the one that generates the highest profits. Although the consumption of the products of the retailer in the United States generate 67 percent of its total sales, the brand sees Mexico as its largest international market.
Until 2020, Walmart Mexico and Central America had a total of 2,634 branches in Mexico; of them, 80 percent is Bodega Aurrerá, Superama and Walmart Express.
Previously, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) had already put the brand on the public agenda when he accused that private companies that have supply technologies such as Bimbo, Walmart and OXXO are subsidized and pay less for the energy they consume compared to average Mexican household.
“It is not true that private investment in electricity is synonymous with clean energy. Many private companies produce electricity with fuel oil,” said Martí Batres in a tweet.
It is not true that private investment in electricity is synonymous with clean energy. Many private companies produce electricity with fuel oil.#ReformaEléctricaVa
– Martí Batres (@martibatres) April 17, 2022
The “preferential” rates for private companies are the result of a self-supply figure that emerged in 1992 with the reforms to the Electric Power Public Service Law. Due to the CFE’s lack of sufficient resources to provide energy to industries, the reform authorized private companies to generate energy for their own consumption.
In the words of AMLO during the press conference on March 19, 2021, he said that if companies produced clean energy they received a subsidy and spent less on electricity.
“They bought electricity cheaper than consumers, than what most Mexicans pay for electricity,” said the president.
With the Electricity Industry Law of 2014, the practice ended, but the contracts with those private companies that made the deal before it came into force were maintained. Until now, with the reform proposed by the Executive, self-supply permits must be revoked.
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