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In short: Procurement managers in the energy sector spend 60-80% of their working time on manual administration, often juggling 15-20 separate spreadsheets, which leaves only 1-2 hours a day for strategic work. Meanwhile, energy prices rose 49% between Q1 2024 and Q1 2025, renewable projects bring 10-20 year PPA contracts, and keeping up with NIS2, CBAM and other regulations takes 25-30% of working time. This article maps these challenges, explains how renewable procurement differs from traditional energy buying, and outlines the first practical steps toward a digital, AI-native procurement platform.
For many procurement managers in the energy sector, Monday morning does not start with strategic work on energy costs. It starts with spreadsheets: searching through 15 different files for a single supplier data point and copying figures by hand from one table to another, even though systems that aggregate this information automatically already exist.
This isn't an extreme example. This is the reality for a significant portion of middle managers in the European energy sector. And these procurement challenges only intensify as the industry pivots toward renewable energy.
Evaluating how last week's gas contract negotiations went sounds like a simple task. In practice, it often means opening five different Excel files, comparing the Central Statistical Office price index with a market report, and emailing several colleagues for missing data. By the time all the information is together, the morning is gone, and whether the deal was worth it is still an open question at the afternoon meeting.
Energy sector procurement managers spend 60-80% of their working time on manual administration instead of concentrating on energy procurement strategy. This means that within an 8-hour workday, they can only dedicate 1-2 hours to value-creating procurement activities.
An average procurement manager at a Hungarian energy company works with 15-20 different Excel spreadsheets daily. From supplier data through contract statuses to budget reports, everything is in separate files, often in different formats and without version control.
The same pattern appears in supplier management. Finding out which supplier offered a discount on natural gas can take hours when the information is scattered across several places, and by the time it is found, the offer may already have expired. With a central system, the same search takes minutes.
What does this result in? The constant manual work causes frustration and makes it impossible for procurement managers to leverage their professional knowledge and strategic thinking. Many of them feel like they're working as administrative assistants when they were hired as procurement experts.
The challenge: The 49% increase in energy prices between Q1 2024 and Q1 2025 has created volatility that's impossible to manage with traditional procurement methods. Meanwhile, due to the concentrated structure of the Hungarian energy market, the selection of competitors is also limited.
Timing decisions show the risk clearly. An industrial consumer that postpones a gas contract until spring in the hope of lower prices can instead face a sharp price increase and end up locked into an expensive multi-year contract, which then has to be explained in every monthly report to the CFO.
The advance of renewable energy has fundamentally changed the nature of procurement tasks. While previously buying goods and services, today a procurement manager handles complex, 10-20 year PPA (Power Purchase Agreement) contracts that resemble financial instruments more than traditional procurement agreements.
The solar energy boom and bust in Hungary: From 2015 to 2023, Hungary's solar energy capacity grew from 110 MW to 5,600 MW. This explosive growth overloaded the grid infrastructure, and today "zero MVA available connection capacity" situations are common, setting renewable energy projects back by years.
Supplier failure adds a further layer. If the panel supplier goes bankrupt during the construction of a solar park, procurement has to find a replacement quickly, and may also need to run an ESG audit of the new supply chain to rule out forced labor. Traditional procurement training rarely prepares managers for this kind of situation.
Procurement managers spend 25-30% of their working time keeping up with constantly changing regulations. In addition to Hungarian national requirements, compliance with EU directives (NIS2, CBAM, GDPR, DORA) as well as industry-specific standards (ISO 27001, IAEA requirements for nuclear) is simultaneously necessary.
Example of regulatory complexity: A simple cross-border energy trading agreement requires compliance with 8 different regulatory frameworks, handling three currencies, and approval from authorities in multiple countries.
The typical conflict situation: The CFO expects cost reduction, the COO demands 100% supply security, the legal department wants risk-free contracts, while the sustainability manager sets aggressive green energy goals. The procurement manager often faces an impossible task: satisfy everyone at once.
At the Hungarian subsidiary of a multinational group, this can mean four demands at once: headquarters wants a 10% cost reduction, local management wants no supply interruptions, compliance wants every contract to meet the new NIS2 requirements, and the sustainability team wants fully renewable operations, all while the IT system has not kept pace.
Renewable energy procurement fundamentally differs from traditional energy procurement. This isn't about commodities but complex projects where the procurement manager must become a project manager, technical expert, and financial analyst all at once.
The most important differences:
Traditional energy procurement:
Renewable energy procurement:
Time recovery: By automating routine tasks, only 20-30% of working time would need to be spent on administration instead of 60-80%. This means a procurement manager could dedicate 5-6 hours daily to strategic tasks instead of the current 1-2 hours.
Decision support: With real-time market data and analytics, the impact of price volatility could be significantly reduced. Procurement decisions would be data-driven instead of the current "trust in luck" approach.
Risk management: Integrated supplier risk management and ESG monitoring would reduce the failure risk of renewable projects.
Compliance automation: After setting compliance parameters, the system independently checks compliance, enabling proactive intervention to prevent irregularities.
Discover our solutions for companies in the energy sector
The Hungarian energy sector stands at the intersection of three critical trends:
Leading energy companies have already taken action. The MVM Group is launching smart meter programs, and regional players are testing AI-based procurement solutions. The question is no longer whether digital transformation is needed in the energy sector, but when and how.
The goal of a successful procurement transformation is easy to describe. A procurement manager opens a dashboard in the morning and sees within minutes which tender opportunities are open, which supplier risks are critical, and where savings are easiest to achieve. Instead of searching through spreadsheets, the time goes into the work procurement experts were hired to do.
The decision is yours. The technology already exists. The question is just when you'll start taking advantage of it.
Procurement software evaluation checklist: Detailed checklist to evaluate your software opportunities. The checklist includes:
Download the procurement software evaluation checklist here.
Why do procurement managers in the energy sector spend so much time on administration?
Because the information they need is scattered. A typical procurement manager at a Hungarian energy company works with 15-20 separate spreadsheets every day, covering supplier data, contract statuses and budget reports, often in different formats and without version control. As a result, 60-80% of working time goes on manual administration, leaving only 1-2 hours a day for strategic procurement work.
How is renewable energy procurement different from traditional energy procurement?
Traditional energy procurement buys commodities through 1-3 year contracts from a mature, consolidated supplier base. Renewable procurement means 10-20 year commitments in a dynamic, fragmented market of smaller players, with technology, project and supplier bankruptcy risks. The procurement manager has to act as project manager, technical expert and financial analyst at the same time.
What is a PPA, and why is it complex?
A PPA (Power Purchase Agreement) is a long-term contract, typically for 10-20 years, to buy electricity from a specific generation source such as a solar park. It behaves more like a financial instrument than a traditional procurement contract, so it requires complex financial modeling, an ESG audit of the supply chain and careful management of project and supplier risk.
Which regulations place the heaviest burden on energy procurement?
Alongside Hungarian national requirements, procurement teams must comply with EU rules such as NIS2, CBAM, GDPR and DORA, and with industry standards such as ISO 27001 or, in the nuclear sector, IAEA requirements. Keeping up with these takes 25-30% of working time, and a single cross-border energy trading agreement can involve 8 different regulatory frameworks.
How should a company start its digital procurement transformation?
Start by quantifying the problem: estimate what manual administration, slow decisions and weak risk management cost today. Then build the business case from concrete examples, align with IT, Finance and Legal, launch a pilot in a well-defined area such as renewable project procurement, and start talking to potential solution providers to understand what results are achievable and in what timeframe.
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