Why Are UK Energy Prices So Damn High?

For years, the UK’s electricity market has been stuck in the past. Despite the rise of smart meters, dynamic tariffs, and an increasingly flexible grid, the market has still relied on outdated estimated usage profiles rather than actual real-time consumption. That’s right: even in 2024, most consumers—especially households—are billed based on historic averages rather than the electricity they actually use at any given moment.

Now, that’s about to change. Market-Wide Half-Hourly Settlement (MHHS) is set to overhaul the UK’s electricity market by requiring every single customer, from households to industrial users, to be settled based on their actual half-hourly energy usage. The rationale is clear: more accurate billing, better price signals, and a system that rewards consumers for using electricity when it’s cheapest and greenest.

But here’s the question nobody seems to be asking: What if this turns out to be a massive regulatory headache that doesn’t actually lower costs?