Western Power Distribution has awarded flexibility contracts totalling 94.8MW following its fourth procurement round.
Although less than the volume originally sought, the distribution network operator said market interest is increasing: it received 85 bids across all 42 of the constraint areas in scope.
To date, WPD has procured 217MW of flexibility – which it will use to reduce reinforcement where networks are running closer to capacity.
WPD has released requirements across 47 constraint management zones totalling 391MW. According to the ENA’s flexibility portal, it is aiming to procure up to 667MW by the end of 2020. Collectively, DNOs have indicated they plan to buy around 2GW of flexibility services in 2020, with SSE and SPEN now coming to market.
“Over the past two years we have sought to procure flexibility services regularly at six months intervals, and it’s great is that we are continuing to see an increase in interest and an increase to the contracted flexibility volume with each round,” said WPD network strategy manager Ben Godfrey.
“It’s clear that our approach to securing flexibility services is effective and it’s also a reassuring indication that the market for distribution flexibility is growing.”
WPD has so far bought more flexibility services than any other DNO, across a wider area. Godfrey said “there’s more work for us to do” and that WDP will keep refining its products in a bid to increase market participation.
The network operator will publish further flexibility locations on 29 June and launch procurement on 3 August. Interested parties can register here.
Meanwhile, WPD also seeks participants for another kind of flexibility trial, which aims to reduce the impact of DNO flexibility services on the wider electricity market. It’s using the NODES marketplace to achieve closer to real-time procurement and creating more links to suppliers. See details here.
WPD’s Ben Godfrey is one of a number of flexibility experts speaking at The Energyst Event, Silverstone, 27-28 October. It’s free to attend, register here.
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