BSC Insights – System Prices

In this BSC Insight, Muhammad Raees Usman, Product Analyst in our Analysis & Insight Team, outlines how you can use newly Open Data from the BSC Modification P398 Open Data Request service to gain an insight into the energy market. He does this in view of the unprecedented market conditions experienced in the second half of 2021 and how these conditions led to a substantial number of Supplier default events. The article also provides an insight in to how Python can be used to ingest Open data files for analysis.

In this BSC Insight our Senior Product Analyst, Emma Tribe, shows how the high wholesale gas prices have caused System Prices to increase to record levels in 2021.

In this BSC Insight article, Mehdi Jafari outlines the recent trends in forward market prices and how we measure the Credit Assessment Price (CAP) process effectiveness against the System Buy Price. The article also provides an update on our Insight Article in May 2021, where the sixth CAP change of 2021 was in process.

We issued a consultation on changing the Credit Assessment Price (CAP) value on 17 May 2021. This is the sixth time in 2021 that the CAP value is going to change. This is the most CAP change events to occur in the first five months of the year since the CAP weekly monitoring process was introduced in 2007.

In the 2020/21 financial year, the absolute cashflow for BSC Trading Charges was £2.96bn. This was the most cashflow settled in a financial year. In this BSC Insight our Analysis and Insight Senior Product Analyst, Emma Tribe, explains how BSC Trading Charges are settled by Elexon.

In 2021, we have seen the highest System Prices since 2001, which was the first year of the New Electricity Trading Arrangement. The highest price this year was £4,000/MWh on 8 January in Settlement Periods 39 and 40. On 12 April 2021, the System Price was over £1,000/MWh for five consecutive Settlement Periods. In this BSC Insight, one of our Product Analysts, Angus Fairbairn, looks into how and why these high prices occur.

National Grid ESO raised BSC Issue Group 92 to review the Reserve Scarcity Price with representatives from across the electricity industry. The need for this arose due to feedback from industry representatives that the Reserve Scarcity Price has had less of an impact on System Prices than expected and a need to ensure the calculation is fit for a future energy market.

While much of the UK economy was shut down between mid-March and Mid-June, due to measures to manage COVID-19, the UK electricity market has seen an increase in negative System Prices. In this Elexon Insight, Emma Tribe explains why this was the case and shows the trends for negative System Prices in April and May 2020.

The System Price reached £2,242/MWh and £1,708/MWh in the early evening of Wednesday 4 March 2020. This was the first instance of the System Price being over £2,000/MWh since 2001. In this Elexon Insight our Market Advisor, Emma Tribe explains how the System Price was calculated and how it compares to historic System Prices.