As of Wednesday, the average price of electricity on the Estonian electricity exchange for February is was €150.3 per megawatt-hour (MWh), or 15 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh). Last year, the average price in February was €75.5 per MWh.

According to Eesti Energia, the main reason for this year's prolonged period of high prices is the low amount of wind, which has kept wind power production low.

"As a result, the Baltic countries have to cover more of their consumption with electricity from fossil fuel-fired power plants, which will also push up prices. At the moment, we expect that the beginning of March could bring some price improvements as the forecasts show improving wind conditions," said Armen Kasparov, heading of energy trading at Eesti Energia.

A little under two weeks ago, market participants cited four main reasons behind the high electricity prices. The non-operation of the EstLink 2 connection, the opening of the frequency reserve market, temporary reduction of transmission capacity, and to weak winds.

Part of these two transmission capacities – the Lithuania-Poland and Lithuania-Sweden connections – had been kept in reserve to maintain frequency on the grid. A further 250 MW of transmission capacity kept in reserve has now been returned to the market. However, this has not had a significant impact on electricity prices in the Baltics.

Alexela's energy trade analyst Kaspar Kuusmik noted that while the Lithuania-Sweden interconnection is now operating at its previous capacity, the Lithuania-Poland interconnection is operating at less than half the capacity it was at before desynchronization.

A notable contributor to higher electricity prices is the increased cost of gas in the region, which is now 35 percent more expensive than a year ago. In addition, the cost of one tonne of CO2 has risen from €60 to €70, said Kuusmik.

Sun distorts consumption statistics

According to Elering, electricity consumption in Estonia fell to a very low level on Monday and Tuesday this week. While on a normal winter day it is well over 1,000 MWh, on both days consumption fell to 600 megawatts and was even below that in the afternoon.

Elering told ERR it is likely that household producers, or micro-generators, began producing their own electricity with solar panels.

Kuusmik said high air temperatures have also played a role. "A big part of the drop was due to solar panels thawing out after the snow during the warm weather. A warmer day in general was important, because in Tallinn, for example, it was 6C at noon and this affects the heating demands of buildings," he said.

Kasparov said consumption was indeed down due to the increase in solar energy. "Micro-generators are covering more and more of their consumption due to the sunny weather and this so-called hidden generation distorts the consumption curve," he said.

Kuusmik added that although the solar conditions were very good on Tuesday, over February as a whole month, both solar farm yields and temperatures this year were lower than in 2024. These factors all affect the final price of electricity.

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