On the chronic electricity crisis

– The generators spread across every part of the Gaza Strip pose a constant danger to people's lives, standing with their fuel tanks amid residential areas and atop the roofs of houses. They are unregulated, without official registration, and there is no way to confirm they apply safety and security procedures.

– Reliance on generators is a workaround that deals with the crisis's symptoms — a “crisis economy” — not its roots. Recourse to private generators has scattered attention away from the search for sustainable strategic solutions.

– The generators exploit and consume components of the electricity sector's infrastructure (poles, network, transformers, and the rest) free of charge — public property the private sector has no right to exploit without payment.

– The recent proposals to lower the sale price of a kilowatt of generator electricity confer legitimacy on this kind of business the crisis created; instead of confronting the crisis, these short-term solutions profit from it and keep it without radical resolution.

– The sale price of a kilowatt from the generators was 4 shekels — a very high price. As a reminder: the purchase price of a kilowatt from the Israeli electricity company, which sells 120 megawatts to the Gaza Strip, is half a shekel, while the sale price of a kilowatt from the generation station is 1.2 shekels. That is, buying electricity from Israel is far cheaper than the electricity generated by Gaza's power station — and far, far cheaper than generator electricity.

– It would be economically very worthwhile to work on increasing the quantity of electricity purchased from Israel at half a shekel per kilowatt and selling it to the people in place of the generator electricity that was sold to the consumer at 4 shekels throughout the past ten years, and at 2.5 shekels since a week ago. Buying electricity at lower prices would have very large positive results for the standard of living, poverty rates, the cost of local production, and more.

– The chronic electricity crisis that shows us its ugly face from time to time needs strategic solutions, among them: 1) investing intensively in renewable energy from sun and wind; 2) increasing the quantity of electricity purchased from Israel (the 161 line); 3) hastening the extension of the gas line to the generation station; 4) rationalising consumption through prepayment cards and smart cards; 5) applying the law to those able to pay while granting reductions and exemptions to those unable.

– The cost of applying all or some of these solutions is far less than the cost of managing the crisis we have lived through for years.