4/24/2020 Loopflows and unscheduled energy flows – explaining the mystery – EURACTIV.

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Loop ows and unscheduled energy

ows – explaining the mystery
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Zonal electricity market design, currently applied in Europe, is one of the legal-administrative attempts at
framing a complex phenomenon into simpli ed rules. [Shaiful Rizal Mohd Jaafar/Shutterstock]

The European By
interconnected
continuing to power
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Thousands of synchronously interconnected generation units, and advanced control systems guarding its
secure operation, ensure that the demand is continuously satis ed, in all instances of time, providing
reliable energy supply for all Europeans. In  power system operation it is the laws of physics that prevail
over administrative and legal boundaries.

Zonal electricity market design, currently applied in Europe, is one of these legal-administrative attempts
at framing complex phenomena into simpli ed rules. However, simpli cations are often too far going, so
that when “simple” zonal market model is confronted with complex physical interactions in
interconnected meshed power system, challenges arise.

The increasing gap between markets and system operations and rising levels of loop ows and
unscheduled power ows are among the most important ones. However, what are these “loop ows” and
“unscheduled ows”?

Where exactly is the problem?

European market is organized in bidding zones, with borders mostly aligned with political ones. By its
inherent feature, transactions concluded on EU electricity market can be divided into two categories:
transactions within a bidding zone and transactions between bidding zones. First kind of transactions is
carried out under the ‘copper plate model’ and is thus not restricted by any system constraints, nor has it
to compete for transmission capacity. The second category of transactions, the cross-border one,
requires access to cross-border capacity and is by de nition limited to the capability of the transmission
system to support cross-border transactions. Inherently, zonal market model foresees thus di erent
treatment of internal and cross-zonal transactions. However, notwithstanding the administrative and
legal boundaries, the electrical energy ows according to the laws of physics. As a consequence,
transactions within and between bidding zones utilize the whole set of transmission lines, including lines
located in countries not directly participating in these transactions.

Categories of power ows

Commercial energy transactions may be concluded between market participants within the country
(bidding zone) or/and cross-border. In order to facilitate good understanding of the phenomena, it is
worthwhile to consider the implications of commercial transactions on di erent types of physical
ows [1] (see gure 1.):

Internal ows – physical power ows observed on network elements within a

bidding zone caused by commercial energy transactions within this zone. In this
case, the source, sink, and the concerned line are located in the same bidding zone;
Import/export ows – physical power ows in particular bidding zone caused by
scheduled commercial energy export/import transaction from this bidding zone to
neighbouring bidding zones;
Loop ows – physical power ows in one bidding zone caused by internal
commercial energy transactions within another bidding zone;
Transit ows – physical power ows in one bidding zone caused by commercial
energyByexports andtoimports
continuing transactions
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Figure 1. Physical power ow categories resulting from di erent commercial energy transactions.

What is the typical system reality?

The above Figure 1 gives overview of all above physical ow categories. It is important to highlight that in
reality, all kinds of these physical power ows occur at the same time, i.e. internal energy transactions are
causing internal physical ows inside concerned bidding zone and also  loop ows in all other bidding
zones, while export and import energy transactions cause import and export power ows on directly
a ected borders and transit ows in other bidding zones. In fact, every commercial energy transaction
will be physically realized by power ows scattered over the interconnected power system according to
Kirchho laws.

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Transit ows can be scheduled or unscheduled, the di erence being the level of coordination during
capacity calculation and allocation. This coordination takes form of regional processes, such as ow-
based, allowing for all transits to be coordinated and scheduled. In absence of such coordination, transits
are unscheduled (i.e. approved by some TSOs without acceptance of other TSOs) and negatively in uence
the a ected TSOs. Loop ows on the other hand, are an externality of the zonal model. Simply, zonal
capacity allocation is not able to capture loop ows since its level is not in any reliable way correlated with
exports and imports. Since loop ows cannot be “scheduled” during allocation, they are considered in the
capacity calculation “base case” necessary to calculate cross-border capacities. This is necessary because
loop ows will appear in real time irrespectively of the level of cross-border commercial exchanges.

How to cope with loop ows and unscheduled power ows?

Decomposition of power ows into ow categories is not trivial, but it can be done with reasonable
accuracy. Having the information about di erent types of ows, one is able to address the underlying
issues more e ciently:

Loop ows – as externality of zonal market and inevitable consequence of such

market design choice, loop ows cannot be completely eliminated. However, the
better the zones (smaller, more internally interconnected), the lower the loop ows.
Hence, in order to address the issue of loop ows, one needs to either reinforce
internal grid within the zones to minimise the gap between the assumed
copperplate and reality, or split the zones into smaller ones to better re ect power
system capability.
Internal ows – internal ows result from internal energy transactions. Since grid
users of particular country paid via transmission tari s for the internal grid
development, they have a legitimate right to use this grid. Hence, these ows should
be considered as legitimate under zonal design (in contrast to loop ows which is
unwanted externality).
Import/export ows – these are physical e ect of direct imports and exports. Since
they are scheduled between directly a ected TSOs (countries), they could be
considered as coordinated and legitimate under zonal markets. With more regional
coordination, these types of ows will be handled even better.
Unscheduled transit ows – these result from lack of or insu cient coordination, so
improvement in capacity calculation and allocation can address these.
Implementation of Flow-Based covering as large geographical area as possible is the
right approach to address these;

Improving European cross-border market will require progresses in all above domains: grid investments,
better zones and better coordination of cross-border trade.

[1] De nitions are based on ACER-ENTSO-E, Joint Task Force Cross Border Redispatch Flow De nitions,
2011.

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