National Grid ESO is awarding early-start contracts to manage constraints in the East-Anglia region, thereby delivering £20 million in consumer savings sooner.
The Constraint Management Intertrip Service (CMIS) was first launched in April 2022, to tackle constraints caused by insufficient network capacity. It enabled 367GWh of extra renewable electricity generation and saved £95.2 million in costs usually paid by consumers, in its first year alone.
These savings come from decreased curtailment costs, as the CMIS, instead of paying constraint costs to turn off generation when there is the risk of a fault, allows clean renewable generation to continue exporting energy for longer. Thereby, minimising the pre-emptive curtailment of renewable generation, and granting the ESO’s control room more flexibility.
Now, three generating companies with a total of 10 units have been awarded the interim Constraint Management Intertrip Service (CMIS) for the East Anglia (EC5) area starting in February 2024. These units will continue under the service until the enduring service is expected to begin in April 2025.
“The constraint management intertrip service is fundamental towards solving a heavily constrained area of the grid, reducing balancing costs,” said Julian Leslie, director of strategic energy planning and Chief Engineer at the ESO.
“The ESO is driving forward innovative solutions to manage constraints on the system, whilst maximising our ability to utilise renewable generation, supporting the journey to 100% zero carbon operations by 2035.
“As part of our wide-ranging five-point plan to manage system constraints this service, alongside other workstreams, will be key to reducing balancing costs and ultimately saving consumers millions of pounds.”
