Amprion publishes Market Report 2019 for the Central Western Europe region
The transmission system operator Amprion has published its market report for the years 2015 to 2018. In this, the company considers the development in the electricity market in the Central Western Europe (CWE) region. With its transmission capacity, Amprion enables an export of electricity of up to eight gigawatts (GW) in high-load times which corresponds to more than half of the total German export performance. Amprion thus represents a central hub for electricity trading with European neighbours.
In the report (Studies and Statements), Amprion summarises data from the so-called flow-based market coupling. This method serves to make the exchange between the markets in the Central Western Europe region efficient. Instead of looking at only cross- border lines, the entire network of the region is included in the coupling of the electricity markets. The participating transmission system operators can in this way optimally promote trading and at the same time ensure network security.
Based on its position, the Amprion network represents a central hub for trading with European neighbours and thus provides an important contribution to their security of supply. Amprion transmits up to eight GW of electricity which corresponds to more than half of the 15 GW that Germany exports during peak periods. Electricity transmission through the Amprion network thus also supports the security of supply in the adjacent countries, especially in critical situations such as in winter 2016/2017.
Also showing as trends are: The integration of CWE markets (Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Germany, Austria) has already advanced far and continues to progress further. This can be shown by the fact that the electricity trading prices for the following day (day-ahead prices) between 2015 and 2018 were identical for every third hour. At the same time, the growing difference between the positive and negative price peaks also demonstrates the challenge of the strongly fluctuating supply of renewable energies.
Dr Hans-Jürgen Brick, Chief Commercial Officer and Chief Financial Officer of Amprion GmbH, said: "The mutual dependency in Europe on system security will continue to rise. We are therefore doing everything physically possible to connect the national markets and networks even better." For example, this is visible in the so-called security margin (flow reliability margin), which transmission system operators maintain: with nine percent, it is lower for Amprion than the CWE average (13 percent). Amprion thus supports a high liquidity of the European market.
"The analyses make it clear that the measures implemented by Amprion and other transmission system operators in recent years have effectively supported cross-border trading as well as system security of European neighbours", said Brick. However, it is also important to consider the physical circumstances of the network.
