Monthly Balancing Services Summary (MBSS) Costs FY21-22

The costs of balancing services used by the Electricity System Operator. These costs are broken into individual months in the current current financial year, as well as by each individual service.

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Table Information

MONTH_END

Title Month
Type yearmonth
Description The month Balancing Services Use of System (BSUoS) forecasted for. 
Comment
Example Mar-20
Unit

Energy Imbalance (£)

Title Energy Imbalance
Type number
Description Energy imbalance is the difference between the amount of energy generated in real time, the amount of energy consumed during that same time, and the amount of energy sold ahead of the generation time for that specific time period. The monthly energy imbalance cost can be negative or positive depending whether the market was predominantly long or short. 
Comment The energy imbalance could be a positive or negative number.
Example 0.215763367
Unit £

Operating Reserve (£)

Title Operating Reserve
Type number
Description Positive Reserve that is managed in the BM, through trades, or SO-SO services. Positive Reserve is required to operate the transmission system securely, and provides the reserve energy required to meet the demand when there are shortfalls, due to demand changes or generation breakdowns.
Comment
Example 4.426823481
Unit £

STOR (£)

Title Short Term Operating Reserve
Type number
Description Short-term Operating Reserve (STOR) allows us to have extra power in reserve for when we need it. It helps us meet extra demand at certain times of the day or if there’s an unexpected drop in generation.
Comment
Example 5.052728475
Unit £

Constraints (£)

Title Constraints - England & Wales
Type number
Description Actions taken by the ENCC for non energy system management reasons in England and Wales. 
Comment
Example 23.32458662
Unit £

Negative Reserve (£)

Title Negative Reserve
Type number
Description A Negative Reserve service can provide the flexibility to reduce generation or increase demand to ensure supply and demand are balanced. The service is held in reserve to cover unforeseen fluctuations in demand, or generation from demand side PV and wind.
Comment
Example 0.104437587
Unit £

Fast Reserve (£)

Title Fast Reserve
Type number
Description Fast Reserve provides the rapid and reliable delivery of active power through an increased output from generation or a reduction in consumption from demand sources, following receipt of an electronic dispatch instruction from National Grid. Fast Reserve service must commence within two minutes following instruction, at rates of 25MW or greater per minute and providing a minimum of 50MW
Comment
Example 8.215331714
Unit £

Response (£)

Title Response
Type number
Description Response is a service we use to keep the system frequency close to 50Hz. Fast acting generation and demand services are held in readiness to manage any fluctuation in the system frequency, which could be caused by a sudden loss of generation or demand. There are three types of frequency response known as “primary”, “secondary” and “high”. The difference between primary and secondary is the speed at which they act recover the system frequency. Both primary and secondary react to low frequency conditions, and high response
Comment
Example 11.54459979
Unit £

Other Reserve (£)

Title Other Reserve
Type number
Description We currently have several other reserve services that we are not actively procuring and are under review. The aim is to move away from services procured outside of competitive mechanisms, so we do not intend to procure additional volume under the current frameworks. 
Comment
Example 1.32010499
Unit £

Reactive (£)

Title Reactive
Type number
Description We manage voltage levels across the grid to make sure we stay within our operational standards and avoid damage to transmission equipment. Voltage levels are controlled by reactive power, and we pay providers to help manage voltage levels on the system by controlling the volume of reactive power that they absorb or generate.
Comment
Example 6.036476657
Unit £

Black Start (£)

Title Black Start
Type number
Description Black start is the procedure we use to restore power in the event of a total or partial shutdown of the national electricity transmission system. It means we can start up each power station in turn and reconnect them to the grid one by one. In this sort of emergency, a power station can get its electricity supply from a small back-up generating plant on the same site. But not all power stations have one of these, so we have agreements with other suppliers. They help us make sure we have enough black start arrangements in place in case we need them.
Comment
Example 5.32283393
Unit £

Minor Components (£)

Title Minor Components
Type number
Description Any actions that don’t meet the defined rules to categorise costs. This also includes costs which are not specific to an ancillary service. 
Comment
Example 12.58089077
Unit £