Markets and platforms to coordinate the procurement of system services from large-scale and small-scale assets connected to the electricity network

The efficiency and the reliability of the electricity system depend on an efficient collaboration between different market participants. New challenges for the power sector, which require updating the roles of all agents involved, have emerged due to the growing importance of renewable energy sources, the advance of distributed generation, the development of self-consumption, the storage of energy, the electrification of heating and cooling loads and the mass integration of electric vehicles. In this context, the safe and efficient functioning of the electricity system requires the exploitation of untapped flexibility in both generation and demand. Hence, the coordination of distribution system operators (DSOs) and transmission system operators (TSOs) in the procurement of system services provided by units located in both distribution and transmission grids becomes a major challenge. The CoordiNet project, co-financed by the European Union (EU), is intended to a) demonstrate how the TSO, who is responsible for ensuring the balance of the power system in its control area and managing the very high voltage transmission grid, and the DSOs, who are the managers of the high-, medium- and low-voltage distribution grids, can act in a coordinated manner to purchase and activate system services, b) promote the cooperation of all actors and c) eliminate the barriers of active participation for customers in the market. This paper describes the work performed to define the characteristics, functionalities and potential algorithms to ensure the interoperability of the different markets and platforms developed by TSOs and DSOs across Europe, including the proposed system architecture and the description of the blocks it consists of, as well as the implementations that are being used in the three demonstrators