âMarkets Have To Mirror Physicsâ â 1st EPEX Power Market Summit Held In Brussels - European Commission To Strengthen Wholesale Markets And Increase General Flexibility Of Power Markets

On 5 and 6 October EPEX SPOT organised the 1st European Power Market Summit ("EPEX Summit") in Brussels, in cooperation with the Florence School of Regulation. More than 140 high-level stakeholders of the European energy market attended the event: producers, suppliers, transmission system operators (TSOs), market parties and regulatory authorities. Participants discussed on various panels current and future developments “Towards a common vision for European electricity markets”, so the title of the EPEX Summit.

In his keynote speech Christophe Gence-Creux, Head of the Electricity Department of the European Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators (ACER), underlined the need to progress with the Internal Energy Market. He called for a change in the current paradigm according to which cross-border trade could only get the ‘left-overs’ of the TSOs’ network security assessments. Limiting the possibilities of cross-border trade is not compatible with the objective to create a truly integrated European electricity market. “We are in a situation where, in some regions, the space for competition inside the bidding zones is unduly expanded at the expense of the space for competition between bidding zones”, Gence-Creux pointed out.

Bente Hagem, Chair of the Board of ENTSO-E and Executive Vice President at Statnett, stressed the importance to improve markets continuously, for example through dynamic pricing and possibly within-the-day implicit auctions. While “markets have to mirror physics”, a stable regulatory framework is needed.

Juan José Alba Rios, Chair of Eurelectric Markets Committee and Vice President Regulatory Affairs at Endesa, took a stance regarding larger market design, also taking into account the end consumer. He underlined that the transition of the energy system must be realised in a cost-efficient manner and should let consumers reap the benefits.

Concerning the time frames power market design is contingent on,Domenico De Luca provided valuable insights into “the folly of forecasting” prices and market developments. The CEO of AXPO Trading AG pointed to the tendency to use the last few years as a sample to design the markets of the next decade and recommended political decision-makers to avoid this “myopic bias”.