Formal public consultation regarding the draft proposals for the contracts for the balancing service providers (the BSP-contracts)

Topic

The Commission Regulation (EU) 2017/2195 of 23 November 2017 establishing a guideline on electricity balancing (hereafter referred to as “EBGL”) requires the Transmission System Operator to submit the Terms and Conditions for Balancing Service Providers, 6 months after the entry into force of this Regulation, to the relevant regulatory authorities.

Context

In accordance with Article 18 of ‘EBGL’, Elia, as Belgian Transmission System Operator, has prepared the draft proposals for the relevant balancing service contracts (hereafter “BSP contracts”), and are now presented to the stakeholders for a formal public consultation.

Considering that current General Framework Agreements or “GFAs” are fully compliant with the provisions of Articles 18 of EBGL, Elia proposes that existing GFAs qualify as the new terms and conditions (hereafter “T&Cs”) for the balancing service providers as referred to in ‘EBGL’.

However in order to fully comply with EBGL, Elia proposes a modified structure for the set of “BSP-contracts”, which include the above-mentioned terms and conditions that are in line the requirements of article 18 of EBGL supplemented by General Conditions. In addition, some terminology references have been integrated in the new “BSP-contracts” and certain articles had to be revised in order to adapt to the new reality of a regulated document.
The structure proposed for the “BSP-contracts” aims to :

1. Facilitate reading and transparency of new contracts to providers;
2. Comply with EBGL requisites and;
3. Provide flexibility for future consultations.

Period

The consultation period ran from 15 March up to and including 15 May 2018.