National Grid procures 138.6MW of demand turn-up to balance grid in summer

March 20, 2017

National Grid has procured 138.6MW of fixed demand turn-up (DTU) provision, one of the ways it manages excess generation over spring and summer. Six companies were successful of nine firms that tendered a total of 262MW.

While the headline procurement is less than last year’s tender round of 309 MW, the DTU service has evolved so that companies can also bid in their flexibility on a fortnightly basis.

Simec Lochaber Hydropower secured contracts for 30MW; SSE secured contracts for 29.4MW; Engie won 15MW; MVV Environment Ridham won 20MW; Restore won 25MW; Alkane energy won 19.2MW.

Those successful bidders will in the main be paid an availability fee of £1.50 (though Engie has an availability fee of £1.75/MWh for 2MW of capacity). Their utilisation rates range from £60/MWh to £97/MWh, with prices submitted, speed of response, duration of response and location key factors in assessing bids, according to National Grid.

Around 54MW of fixed DTU procured will come from load response; 37MW from standby/back up generation with the remainder coming from balancing support generation.

While companies including Centrica, Enernoc and Flexitricity were unsuccessful in the fixed bidding round, it is likely that they will reenter assets into the fortnightly tender, with the DTU service running from 27^th March to 28^th October in 2017.

See the DTU data here.

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