The capacity allocation method of European electricity market and its implications for China

Abstract

Nowadays, the transaction scale of the cross-provincial electricity market in China has increased, and the problem of transmission capacity allocation attracts the government’s attention. During the development of the European unified electricity market, capacity allocation methods based on bidding zones such as Available Transfer Capacity (ATC) and Flow-Based Market Coupling (FBMC) have realized regional market coupling and improved grid utilization. This article intends to analyze the allocation methods of transmission capacity in the European electricity market, focusing on the comparison between the ATC and the FMBC, considering the actual background of the Chinese electricity market, especially the differences between the Chinese market and the European market in the grid structure and marketization process, it is more suitable to adopt ATC in China and it makes the suggestion for the application of the capacity allocation method. Besides, the idea of bidding zone simplification is also worth learning. It is also recommended that provincial institutions exchange data related to capacity allocation to coordinate the calculation of trading domains.

Keywords

• Available transfer capacity
• Flow-based market coupling
• Capacity allocation
• Capacity calculation
• Regional electricity market