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Flanders' Capacity Tariff, Explained

On top of what you use, you've paid for a few years now also for HOW you use it — specifically for your peak moments. That's Flanders' capacity tariff, and it often appears unclearly on the bill.

Why there's more on your bill than just kWh

You used to mainly pay for the total number of kilowatt-hours consumed each year. Since the rollout of the digital meter and Flanders' capacity tariff, your peak power draw also counts — the highest quarter-hourly average power you draw from the grid within a given period.

This page describes Flanders' capacity tariff, which bills households on their measured quarter-hourly peak power (kW), calculated by Fluvius under VREG rules. This mechanism doesn't exist for ordinary households in Wallonia or Brussels. In Wallonia, you pay a time-of-use tariff (mono-hourly, bi-hourly, or from 2026 the Impact tariff) — Wallonia does have its own "capacity tariff," but it only applies to solar-panel owners (prosumers) and is based on inverter power, not your measured peak usage. In Brussels (Sibelga), network costs are tied to your connection power, not a measured peak.

How Fluvius measures your peak power (the quarter-hourly average)

Fluvius, the Flemish grid operator, looks at the quarter-hour with the highest average power in a billing period. A brief spike — say your water heater and EV charger happening to start at the same time — counts just as heavily as a peak that lasts the whole evening, because it's that single quarter-hourly average that matters.

Why two households with the same yearly usage can pay different amounts

Two households with exactly the same yearly usage can pay a different capacity tariff, depending on how spread out or concentrated their usage is. A comparison that only looks at your total kWh misses a real part of the cost — that's why we calculate using your own measured quarter-hourly data, not a yearly total.

Lowering your capacity tariff: spreading out EV charging, heat pumps, and water heaters

Spreading out big loads like an EV charger, heat pump, or water heater over time lowers your peak power, and therefore your capacity tariff — even without changing your total usage. Whether that's worth considering for your situation depends on what your usage looks like today.

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