The cabinet is expected to approve measures to curb the rising price of energy at its weekly meeting on Tuesday, according to Energy Minister Supattanapong Punmeechaow.
Measures include the extension of the excise tax cut on diesel of five baht per litre which is due to end on Sept 20.
The tax cut was first approved in February, when Russia invaded Ukraine and US President Joe Biden issued orders restricting mainland oil drilling.
Mr Supattanapong said the cabinet will consider how long the reduction should continue.
Cabinet would also look into household electricity charges and consider a subsidy for the September-December quarter, when the price will rise to 4.72 baht per kilowatt hour (KWh), or unit.
The government has allocated 8 billion baht for the subsidy.
Mr Supattanapong said on Monday that since mid-2021 energy authorities had spent more than 200 billion baht subsidising the price of diesel, cooking gas, compressed natural gas and electricity bills.
He said 120 billion baht was spent through the Oil Fuel Fund to curb diesel and cooking gas prices, 80 billion baht through the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand to control power prices and 6.5 billion baht through PTT Plc to control the price of compressed natural gas for the transport sector.
The subsidy cost did not include the loss of state revenue from the excise tax cut.
Mr Supattanaong said controlling the cost of energy was crucial to helping businesses survive.
He blamed the record-high cost of electicity, at 4.72 baht per unit, on the price of import liquefied natural gas, which this month rose four-fold to US$40 per million British thermal units (BTU) over the same period last year.
At this price for imported LNG for power generation, the cost of electricity would have risen to 8-9 baht per unit without domestic gas and Myanmar gas, Mr Supattanapong said.
He said authorities are closely monitoring the movement of the global energy market, particularly for the coming winter season when energy demand for heat would rise.
Khomgrich Tantravanich, secretary-general of the Energy Regulatory Commission, said people might not see the cost of electricity below four baht per unit for the next couple of years, given the high price of imported LNG and the limited domestic gas production.
Gas was used for 60% of electricity generation and costly imported LNG made up 20% of the gas supply. That was the reason for the record-high power tariff, he said.
The cost of electricity generation was 10 baht per unit using LNG, 2 baht using domestic gas and 6 baht for diesel, Mr Khomgrich said.
