SINGAPORE: Green electricity retailer ES Power will transfer all of its business and residential consumers – amounting to more than S$15 million in electricity retail contracts – to fellow retailer iSwitch by the end of this month, as part of a partnership amid stiff competition in the local market.
Mr Quek Leng Chuang, managing director of ES Power’s parent company Environmental Solutions (Asia) (ESA), told CNA on Thursday (Jun 6): “We will not be retailing electricity in the Open Electricity Market for very much longer.”
Advertisement Advertisement “We will work in partnership with iSwitch where they will take care of customers' electricity supply, while we will take care of the environmental attributes,” he added.
iSwitch said ES Power's customers have been notified of the transfer.
The transfer process is “purely administrative and performed electronically” so there will be no disruption to electricity supplies, iSwitch said in a media release.
Advertisement Advertisement It will also “undertake and honour the same electricity rate, and all contractual terms and conditions of the existing contracts”, it added.
iSwitch has participated in the Open Electricity Market – an initiative to fully liberalise Singapore’s retail power market and allow households to buy power from retailers other than SP Services – since the pilot launch in Jurong last April. The takeover of ES Power’s contracts will make it the biggest green electricity retailer in Singapore, it said.
ES Power, which received its license to retail electricity in 2016 and positions itself as a retailer of green energy such as carbon-neutral electricity, entered the market months later at the start of the phased nationwide roll-out of the Open Electricity Market.
Its planned departure follows the exit of Red Dot Power in January, which cited financial challenges.
Given that there are more than 10 retailers involved in the Open Electricity Market, market observers have predicted fierce competition to eventually result in consolidation.
ESA’s Mr Quek said: “You can imagine with 13 retailers just for the Open Electricity Market and even more for businesses, the competition is stiff. That is without a doubt.”
Partnering iSwitch is a “strategic business decision” that will allow ESA, which recovers base and precious metals from industrial waste, to “stay focused” as a sustainability company.
Moving forward, it “will continue to innovate and provide more services dedicated to the vision of a more sustainable future”, added Mr Quek.
As part of the deal announced on Thursday, both companies said they will hold a joint marketing initiative to help promote sustainability in Singapore.
“Through this initiative, iSwitch will be the licensed electricity retailer to supply electricity to all its consumers while ES Power will ‘green-up’ the electricity usage of iSwitch’s customers by offsetting all carbon emissions through the process of retiring carbon credits and renewable energy certificates where applicable,” the statement said.
CNA has reached out to the Energy Market Authority, the industry’s regulator, for comment.
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