The organised electricity markets (power exchanges) in Portugal and Spain joined yesterday the day-ahead market coupling of the North-West Europe region[1], which took place last February. With this development, power exchanges covering 17 European countries are fully interlinked. The current market coupling between Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxemburg, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden will enhance further the development of the single EU energy market by favouring price convergence, which fosters competition and therefore leads to a better choice of services and products for consumers.
“The EU Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators (ACER) welcomes the go-live of the full day-ahead market coupling within and between the North-West and South-West[2] Europe regions, which represents a new landmark towards the European single market” said ACER Director, Alberto Pototschnig today. The Chairman of the ACER Board of Regulators, Lord Mogg also expressed his satisfaction as “this very important milestone occurred as planned, just a few months after the launch of the day-ahead market coupling in North-West Europe.” This achievement rewards the intensive work performed by transmission system operators, power exchanges, national regulatory authorities and the Agency within the voluntary early implementation framework called the regional initiatives process[3].
The electricity markets of Italy and Slovenia are expected to join the coupled markets by the end of 2014.
Also by the end of this year, within the Central-East Europe region[4], an initiative in Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia aims at implementing the so called Price Coupling of Regions[5] which will constitute an important first step towards the future coupling between the Central-East and North-West Europe regions.
1. The North-West Europe region consists of Benelux, France, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Great Britain – Northern Ireland is not included. Austria benefits from the North-West Europe region day-ahead market coupling as it shares the same price area with Germany and Luxembourg. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania benefit from this coupling as they are already linked to the Nordic market. Poland is also involved in this project via the sub-sea cable with Sweden, the SwePol link.
2. The South-West Europe region is formed by France – which belongs to both regions -, Portugal and Spain.
3. Since 2006, when the process started, the Regional Initiatives have supported voluntary regional market integration projects and, more recently, the early implementation of some of the provisions included in the Network Codes which, once these enter into force, will apply across the EU.
4. The Central-East Europe region consists of Austria (also in Central-South Europe), Czech Republic, Germany (also in Central-South and North-West Europe), Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia (also in Central-South Europe).
5. The Price Coupling of Regions is the solution for coupling European day-ahead markets developed by power exchanges and supported by transmission system operators and national regulatory authorities.