We are pleased to present our GB monthly wholesale, balancing & asset value report for April.
Key highlights include:
- Wholesale and Balancing prices continued to increase compared to last month as carbon prices reached record highs of £60/tonne on 30th April, whilst gas prices continued to recover from last year’s level. Wind generation decreased by 40% compared to last month, which increased reliance on thermal generation and pushed up prices.
- Notably, system prices spiked to £1,971.6/MWh for settlement periods 34-36 on 12th April. This was due to a combination of low wind generation and colder than expected weather which pushed up power demand.
- Both total bid and offer volumes in the Balancing Mechanism decreased by 28% and 20% to 0.82 TWh and 0.9 TWh respectively compared to last month due to reduced thermal constraints from low wind output. CCGTs received accepted offer prices similar to those of pumped storage at £112/MWh, as gas costs continued to increase this month by 20%.
- Daily STOR auctions started from 1st April following the new tender format to comply with the European Clean Energy Package. Accepted availability prices have averaged ~£3.19/MW/h with utilisation prices in the BM ranging from £97 – £500/MWh. Aurora’s selected example gas recips in the Balancing Mechanism saw an 84% increase in average offer revenues across the six assets compared to March 2021 as the assets were able to capture BM offer prices of £143/MWh on average. Notably, the two Conrad 20 MW Chatterley and 40 MW Sudmeadow gas recips saw their monthly offer revenues double this month to £4.9k/MW/month compared to March.
- All the benchmark assets saw an increase in their total energy trading as a result of higher captured price in Wholesale and Balancing markets. Both 1hr and 2hr batteries saw an increase of 25% and 28% in gross margins to £7.4/kW/month and £9.7/kW/month respectively. Reciprocating engine assets also saw their monthly margins increase by 11% to £4.2/kW/month.
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