Five years of global impact: How N-SIDE’s Power Matching Algorithm is clearing the electricity markets

Several years ago, we set a clear goal: to provide any Power Exchange and Transmission System Operator with access to the same advanced optimisation standard and high quality that clears Europe’s single-day-ahead market, without lengthy integration cycles, while being configurable and operated locally.

Here are four non-negotiable KPIs define that standard:

Five years on, the Power Matching Algorithm reaches those KPIs daily while supporting Power Exchanges and TSOs on two continents, clearing auctions for energy, capacity, and frequency response and reserve services, considering timeframes going from year-ahead to day-ahead.

Why Market Operators Choose N-SIDE's Power Matching Algorithm

Five practical advantages drive rapid adoption:

1. Scalable by design: Proven on data sets well above 50,000 bids with no material increase in solution time.
2. Product-agnostic: A configuration layer maps bid and auction formats (day-ahead, intraday, reserve, capacity) onto one solver core.
3. Audit-ready outputs: Each run is packaged with a snapshot of inputs, parameters, and solver logs. Reruns may execute at a different pace but always satisfy the same optimality criteria, ensuring the results are reproducible within the solver's tolerance.
4. Fast onboarding: Comprehensive APIs connect to existing gate-closure and settlement systems in weeks, whether the deployment is in the cloud or on-premises.
5. Beyond a tool: Our market design consultants routinely help customers diagnose, understand, and enhance their operations. That expertise ships with the software and builds the best-in-class experience.

Five Years of Impact

Since the first production go-live, the algorithm has become a cornerstone of several distinct market designs.

• Belgium – primary engine of the Capacity Remuneration Mechanism operated by Elia.
• India – four years of continuous day-ahead and intraday operation at the Indian Energy Exchange (IEX)
• Great Britain – more than 1,000 reserve and frequency-response auctions cleared since November 2023 for National Energy System Operator (NESO).
• Japan – twelve months of 15-minute day-ahead clearing for Japan Electric Power Exchange (JEPX).
• Baltic Region – supported the Baltic TSOs (AST, Litgrid, Elering) in connecting to the Continental Europe grid, allowing day-ahead balancing capacity auctions.

On a typical day across these markets, the algorithm:

• Clears more than 900 GWh of nominated volume for Wholesale Electricity Markets, as well as more than 80 GWh of Grid Balancing services;
• Matches more than €50 million of value;
• Produces a solution in a few seconds, even for the largest data sets;
• Delivers 99.9% service availability;
• Executes more than 50 energy, capacity, reserve and response auctions.

Versatility Beyond Day-Ahead

Current production use-cases span the whole timeline of electricity trading:

• Day-ahead energy (hourly and 15-minute)
• Auction-based intraday power
• D-1 capacity & reserve
• Long-term capacity remuneration mechanisms

All share the same solver core, parameterised for each geography and market design.

Continuous Evolution

Our roadmap flows directly from active client projects:

• Deeper customisation: parameters that follow local pricing rules, market designs, and network models allow each customer to adapt the engine to their needs, even during software integration
• New latitudes: rollouts in several geographies validate the solver under different demand patterns, usage requirements, and grid topologies.
• Transversal knowledge: lessons learned and features developed for any customer are integrated into the algorithm's core, so that every new market benefits immediately from the expertise accumulated in earlier projects.
• Scaling horizon: performance tests confirm processing capability beyond 100,000 bids without significantly increasing computation time.

Talk to Our Experts

If you operate a power exchange, run market design for a TSO, or advise policymakers, we would be happy to discuss how N-SIDE's Power Matching Algorithm can support your market. Don’t hesitate to reach out and have a chat with us!