Flexibility coming to the fore in 2023

The past 12 months have been a momentous year for the UK energy sector – though as the sector continues to respond to the international pressure on energy suppliers, we cannot lose sight of the need to create a smarter, greener and more resilient grid.

For me personally, 2022 also marks the point when the Open Networks programme prepared to kick into high gear.  Now in our fifth year, Open Networks is a major industry programme run by Energy Networks Association (ENA). We work with all UK energy networks and industry to lead the transition to a smarter and more flexible national energy system.

I believe, flexibility a low-key but vital success story for the UK’s power grid, as we have the largest local flexibility energy market in the world. However, there’s still much work to do in stitching these local flexibility markets together into a seamless nation-wide whole. Open Networks aims to bring together industry, government, regulators and other stakeholders to support the transformation in how our networks operate, including standardising the customer experience and making accessing the flexibility market easier for everyone.

In 2022, the programme looked at how best to overcome barriers to creating a smarter, more flexible grid. This included how best to align data management processes to ensure anonymised data can more seamlessly be shared across partnerships. We also looked at how service delivery and contracts for flexibility services could be brought together to create interoperability between grid systems. Standardised network development plans (NDPs) were rolled out, along with whole electricity system coordination registers, to allow those making the decisions around network development to have a fuller understanding of the impact of investment. We are also prepared to help resolve potential service conflicts by developing primacy rules between providers. These initiatives, and many more like them, helped to establish the groundwork that we’re now set to build on.

In 2023, we will overhaul and restructure the programme,  making it more focused on practical delivery. It’s set to be our busiest year ever. By listening to our stakeholders we know we need to focus on issues like improving market liquidity to unlock further saving for consumers. We also need to focus on improvements including creating a more consistent user experience and increasing market transparency. These measures aim to bring more people and businesses into the flexibility market, driving its fast adoption. The next big practical steps will be on launching our primary rules and, separately, developing technological solutions to overcome interoperability challenges. All this will be underpinned by the introduction of a common system-wide framework for flexibility.

As the pressures on the UK’s energy market grow, so does the pace at which the Open Networks programmes intends to deliver. We want the UK to continue to set the gold standard for flexibility. I would be keen to hear from anyone in the sector or beyond, on how they might contribute to the programme’s future work.