Electricity Market Design 5: Summary of blog series

Blog 5: Market Design Issues for a smart, flexible, sustainable and secure energy system: Summary blog

Thomas Pownall

24th July 2019

The UK’s electricity market design is outdated. Our current policies and rules dictate how our market operates and reflects a legacy of an electricity system which we need to depart from in order to achieve our decarbonisation targets but, also, to run a cost effective electricity system. We now have the scope to transition to a 21^st century electricity market design, one which supports the deployment of renewable technologies, storage, improved energy efficiencies and demand-side measures.

In this four part blog series we have covered:

Blog 1: We discussed how electricity market design can be considered as a social construct, representing interwoven policies and interests which not only dictate how actors perform within the market, but also offer a glimpse into the historic scenario for which the design was originally proposed.

Blog 2: We then explored several issues which occur with our current electricity market design These issues will only become more prominent and more expensive to customers if we fail to upgrade our electricity market design.

Blog 3: In the third blog we illuminated the importance of market outcomes and network operation being linked. An electricity market design has to reveal value of different services in order for the networks to operate cost-effectively. We then introduced the institutional framework which would support this electricity market design.

Blog 4: As we discussed in the first blog, electricity market designs are a social construct to fulfil intended outcomes. We introduced our guiding vision for the electricity market design. It is important that these goals are made explicit, as they will frame the market design. We then introduce the schematic for this proposed electricity market design, building upon the previous blogs and supported by an institutional framework to provide a summary of each market level (transmission, distribution and sub-GSP) before presenting a timeline of events.

There is only so much depth that can be achieved through a blog series, and it is a very one way process. Please feel free to contact Tom Pownall on t.pownall@exeter.ac.uk if you would like to discuss any views presented here.