The Single Day-ahead Coupling (SDAC) and the PCR EUPHEMIA algorithm

The Single Day-ahead Coupling project sets a single pan-European day-ahead electricity market coupling today 26 European countries (Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Greece, and Bulgaria) with an average daily value of matched trades over EUR 200 million. The integrated European electricity market, as set by CACM Regulation (Commission Regulation EU 2015/1222), is increasing liquidity, efficiency, and social welfare by enabling better usage of generation and transmission resources.

SDAC comes as the evolution of historical projects led by Nominated Electricity Market Operators (NEMO) and Transmission System Operators (TSO), in which the Price Coupling of Regions (PCR) project has played and is still playing a major role. Price Coupling of Regions (PCR) is the project of key European Power Exchanges to develop a single price coupling solution to calculate day-ahead electricity prices across Europe and allocate scarce cross-border transmission capacity most efficiently, by coupling wholesale electricity markets from different regions on a day-ahead basis. This price coupling solution, PCR EUPHEMIA (acronym of Pan-European Hybrid Electricity Market Integration Algorithm), owned by NEMO members of PCR, has been selected as the market-clearing algorithm used in SDAC, and in the context of Single Intraday Coupling (SIDC) for the execution of intraday auctions for the pricing of cross-border capacity (IDAs).

N-SIDE plays a key role in the development of PCR EUPHEMIA and in the European Single Day-ahead Coupling project, as an initial designer of PCR EUPHEMIA in collaboration with PCR members, and provider of the support and maintenance services, as well as of a comprehensive R&D program called the Euphemia LAB, ensuring that the algorithm evolves with new market design requirements and performance challenges.

PCR EUPHEMIA is a highly efficient algorithm: it solves market coupling problems containing hundreds of thousands of orders and thousands of block, smart and complex orders in less than twelve minutes, meeting the high-performance standards required by all NEMOs, TSOs, and NRAs for SDAC. It is also highly versatile: it implements a wide range of market design requirements covering advanced bidding products, network models (ATC, Flow-based, Evolved Flow-based), and specific TSO requirements such as the LTA inclusion ensuring revenue adequacy for Long Term Transmission Rights.

PCR EUPHEMIA is designed to meet high-performance standards stipulated by all NEMOs, TSOs, and NRAs for Single Day Ahead Coupling

SOLUTION FEATURES:

• High performance: achieved by leveraging N-SIDE’s extensive knowledge of the problem and most powerful optimization techniques
• Non-discrimination: justified by the maximization of a widely-agreed criterion – social welfare
• Support of new requirements: successful integration of new products and constraints
• Robustness: enhanced by a dedicated hotline service
  
  

N-SIDE provides maintenance and upgrades services, a 365 days/year hotline support service to react immediately in any exceptional situation, and a comprehensive R&D program innovating on market design requirements and ensuring that EUPHEMIA meets future performance challenges brought by market growth and design evolutions.