Regional Flexibility Markets—Solutions to the European Energy Distribution Grid—A Systematic Review and Research Agenda

Abstract

The German government is aiming to increase the share of renewable energies in the electricity supply to 80% in 2050. To date, however, neither the technical requirements nor the market requirements to implement this aim are provided: Germany is struggling to establish the technical requirements and the market requirements to meet this goal. As an important incentive mechanism, the German government has used and continues to use support measures, such as guaranteed feed-in tariffs, and continuously adapts these to market developments and requirements of the European Union. The purpose of the study is to outline a concept for the implementation of regional flexibility markets in Europe based on a thorough review of technical solutions. The method of a comprehensive review of research in regional flexibility markets of electricity, distribution, and pricing from the study is applied to summarize and discuss the opportunities, risks, and future potentials of grid distribution technology. Based on the insights, a new market-based supply and distribution scheme for electricity, which is aimed to benefit of a fully regenerative, decentral and fairly priced electricity markets on the European level is presented. The study suggests a blockchain based pricing mechanism which shall allow equal market access for consumer, providers, and grid operators and rewards regenerative production and short-distance transmission.

Keywords

• energy policy Germany
• EEG
• electric power grids
• power grid stability
• photovoltaic wind energy
• pricing