The UK’s steel industry has urged the incoming Labour government to cut wholesale electricity prices to help it compete with Europe.

An analysis from UK Steel showed that domestic electricity wholesale prices are more than double the cost of French and Spanish electricity over the past three months. Price data suggests that UK producers faced average wholesale prices of almost £66 per megawatt hour (MWh) in the past three months compared to France’s £27/MWh and Spain’s £28/MWh.

The industry is heavily reliant on electricity for its manufacturing processes, and this demand is expected to grow as new electric arc furnace (EAF) technology comes online. EAFs are considered to be a necessary technology for steel manufacturing to move towards net zero carbon emissions, but the switch is expected to see the sector’s electricity consumption roughly double.

The outgoing Conservative government introduced the British Industrial Supercharger in April of this year, which reduced policy costs related...