Germany – Energy and related services – Benchmarking in der Fernwärmeversorgung u.a. zur Preiskontrolle und Preistransparenz sowie der Vergleichbarkeit von Fernwärmeversorgern unter technischen und betriebswirtschaftlichen Aspekten

District heating supply is a key component of the energy or heat transition, particularly with regard to the decarbonization of heat supply. However, the acceptance of district heating supply by citizens requires. The pricing and its lack of transparency is currently the biggest criticism of district heating supply. Critical voices see deficiencies and limited effectiveness of the current price controls. These are said to be ineffective and unsystematic; a price supervision must be more effective and have a regulatory effect. For such more effective antitrust price control, current data and information on the individual district heating networks are required, among other things. Therefore, it is planned to establish an annual benchmarking process for district heating prices. The aim of the benchmarking is to form comparison groups for the North Rhine-Westphalian district heating supply areas based on the data collected with it. Based on the respective comparison group, the state antitrust authority should be able to determine which district heating supply areas are price-remarkable. In addition, the participating district heating suppliers should be enabled by annual reports on the respective network areas to recognize their own strengths through an objective comparison, to identify performance deficiencies, to derive starting points for optimization measures and to check the effectiveness of measures initiated. Participation in the benchmarking is voluntary for the companies. The costs are borne by the State of North Rhine-Westphalia.