Finland probes investigation into bidding error

Market: Electricity
24/11/23

Finnish energy authority Energiavirasto will start an investigation into a bidding error made on 23 November on electricity exchange Nord Pool, which brought day-ahead power prices in Finland to minus €203.40/MWh for Friday delivery.

The authority is planning to investigate the consequences of the error on the operations of the electricity market and its various participants. Energiavirasto will also examine whether any regulations were violated, and how to prevent similar situations from happening in the future.

The bidding error was made by Norway-based energy firm Kinect Energy. The firm had sent wrong bids for the entire day, selling an average of 5.79GW, according to a Remit notice, which resulted in prices reaching minus €500/MWh for 10 hours between 14:00 and the end of the day.

Despite lower power prices which could have prompted increased consumption in the country, Finnish transmission system operator Fingrid has stated the electricity balance in Finland has been stable today due to active intraday trading. A total of 108.1GWh has traded in the intraday market for Friday delivery at the time of writing, compared with 9.5GWh in total for Thursday delivery. And hourly intraday prices have averaged around €23-77/MWh, well above the equivalent day-ahead hourly prices. If Kinect sold 5.79 GWh/h evenly across the day in the day-ahead market and bought it back at average intraday prices, it would have lost around €36.7mn in total, Argus estimates.

"Production and consumption have been well balanced, and the electrical system in our control room has been used almost like a normal weekday, manager at Fingrid Tuomas Rauhala said.

By Makani Joinville

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