One year, one terawatt hour: The success story of the Swiss Intraday market
Paris / Leipzig / Bern / Vienna, 1st August 2014. In July 2014, a total volume of 30.9 TWh was traded on EPEX SPOT’s Day-Ahead and Intraday markets (July 2013: 29.8 TWh). The volume on the French Day-Ahead market marked a new record with 5,959,611 MWh of traded volume. This is a 5% increase from the previous record in February 2013 (5,673,213 MWh). The upsurge is due to several factors, such as an increase in hydro (+2%) and nuclear power production (+%9) compared to July 2013. At the same time, the usual weak demand in July was lower (-3%) compared to one year earlier. As a result, France exported significantly more electricity (+39% compared to July 2013).
Day-Ahead markets
In July 2014, power trading on the Day-Ahead auctions on EPEX SPOT accounted for a total of 28,339,396 MWh (July 2013: 27,759,196 MWh) and can be broken down as follows:
Prices within the German and the French market, both coupled within the Multi-Regional Coupling, converged 35% of the time.
Intraday markets
On the EPEX SPOT Intraday markets, a total volume of 2,515,395 MWh was traded in July 2014 (July 2013: 2,020,511 MWh).
In July, cross-border trades represented 17.1% of the total Intraday volume. The volume in 15-minute contracts on the German and Swiss Intraday markets reached another all-time high and climbed to 475,655 MWh. It is a 6% increase from the previous record in June 2014 (449,494 MWh). In June, they represented 20.7% – more than one fifth – of the volume traded on the German and Swiss Intraday markets.
One year, one terawatt hour: During the first 365 days after the launch of the Swiss Intraday market on 26 June 2013, 976,241 MWh have been traded, which corresponds to 5% of the total Swiss volumes traded on the spot Exchange. 86.8% of all transactions were concluded across borders. This is a peak value which illustrates well the economic advantages of European power market integration. With the start of the Swiss Intraday market, 15-minute contracts were also launched in Switzerland, with the possibility to trade across borders with the German 15-minute market. With a yearly traded volume of 44,145 MWh or a share of 4.5% of the total Intraday volume, 15-minute contracts have made a precious contribution to the short-term intra-hour adjustment of supply and demand. Furthermore, the Swiss Intraday saw a new record volume in July. The Swiss Intraday market is a real success story and joins the ranks of the most liquid European Intraday markets.
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The European Power Exchange EPEX SPOT SE operates the power spot markets for Germany, France, Austria and Switzerland (Day-Ahead and Intraday). Together these countries account for more than one third of the European power consumption. EPEX SPOT also acts as market operating service provider for the Hungarian Power Exchange HUPX and operates the coupling between the Czech, the Slovak, the Hungarian and soon the Romanian markets on behalf of the local Exchanges. It is a European company (Societas Europaea) based in Paris with branches in Leipzig, Bern and Vienna. Over 220 companies from Europe are active on EPEX SPOT. 217 TWh were traded on EPEX SPOT’s power markets in the first seven months of 2014.