Former Minister Soria testifies that Iberdrola “manipulated” to inflate the price of electricity

Former Minister of Industry Jose Manuel Soria has stated thatIberdrola inflated the price of electricity in 2013, in the framework of the investigation into the energy company for an alleged manipulation of the electricity market.

The Government has announced an investigation into the rising cost of electricity. The first criminal case against the company in this regard began in 2013 and focuses on Iberdrola due to an alleged market disruption to provoke a automatic increase in invoice of consumers.

One of the last to testify has been the former Minister of Industry José Manuel Soria, an appearance that complicates the judicial future of the company Ignacio Sánchez Galán, as reported ‘The confidential‘.

Soria’s statement was on December 4, at the request of the Prosecutor’s Office, which defends that Iberdrola intentionally cut hydraulic production of its reservoirs in the weeks prior to the auction on December 19, 2013.

At that time, the CNMC demonstrated the artificial closure of reservoirs, which caused the bid to end with a rise in light and, with it, a increased cost for small consumers.

Competition confirmed that there had been a manipulation in which Iberdrola had played a key role

The government of Mariano Rajoy It then decided to suspend said auction and asked Competition to make a report on this exorbitant price increase.

Iberdrola, a key role

In this sense, Soria has indicated that when knowing the result of the auction, “all the machinery was started up” to see what had happened.

According to the former head of Industry, they saw that “something strange” had happened and they decided to suspend the auction. Later, Competition confirmed that there had been a manipulation in which Iberdrola had played a key role by generating less hydraulic energy than programmed.