Innovative BiTraDER project awarded funding through Ofgem’s Network Innovation Competition
AFRY Management Consulting will begin preparations for delivery of the innovative BiTraDER project, which has a total cost of £8.4 million, as a project partner to Electricity North West, Electron and Delta-EE.
The innovative BiTraDER project to investigate and trial options for a bilateral trading market was awarded funding through Ofgem’s Network Innovation Competition.
BiTraDER will investigate, design, build and trial – live on the network – options for the introduction of a bilateral trading market through which flexibility providers can trade their position in the merit order stack, which determines the order in which they are asked to curtail their output at times of high demand on the network.
Electricity North West has now received confirmation from the energy regulator, Ofgem, that its application for £6.8 million to the Network Innovation Competition 2021 for BiTraDER has been successful. This means that it can now start preparations for delivery of the project, which has a total cost of £8.4 million, alongside project partners Electron, AFRY Management Consulting and Delta-EE.
BiTraDER aims to reduce barriers to the connection of low carbon generation on the network, boost value for connected resources, and bring down whole system costs by adding value to the flexibility market. The intention is to create a secondary market in which connected parties may re-trade their network capacity rights, enabling parties which have accepted ‘flexible’ connections to buy firm access from other parties close to real time.
AFRY Management Consulting’s role will be to lead development of the trading ‘rules’ for this secondary market, to conduct evaluation and cost-benefit analysis and to support the stakeholder engagement process and dissemination.
The project will run for approximately 4 years, starting in early 2022, and Electricity North West has calculated that it will provide a benefit of £35.5 million and a carbon reduction of 7,649tCO2e for the North West region by 2050 and, if rolled out, a benefit of £581 million and a carbon reduction of 92,114tCO2e for GB.
Matt Brown, VP and Head of Energy at AFRY Management Consulting, said: “We are delighted to contribute to this important development in grid flexibility, which will have an increasingly critical role to play as we transition to a low-carbon economy. BiTraDER will benefit all market participants, from a cost and sustainability perspective.”
The Network Innovation Competition is an annual opportunity for network operators to compete for funding for the development and demonstration of new technologies and operating or commercial arrangements. Congratulations to Electricity North West for achieving a place on the Ofgem innovation podium for the second year running.
