Source - EB GL (Regulation 2017-2195)

Commission Regulation (EU) 2017/2195 of 23 November 2017 establishing a guideline on electricity balancing (EB GL)

Consolidated version through 19 June 2022 (incorporating amendments M1: Regulation 2021/280 and M2: Regulation 2022/828). Swedish language translation (CELEX_3A02017R2195-20220619_3ASV_3ATXT). Document is informational only — the authentic versions are published in the EU Official Journal.

Document metadata

Structure overview

Purpose and relevance

The EB GL is the foundational EU regulation for electricity balancing markets. It establishes:

1. BSP (Balance Service Provider) role — the entity providing balancing services, may aggregate demand, generation, and storage across BRP portfolios
2. BRP (Balance Responsible Party) role — financial responsibility for real-time imbalances
3. National terms obligation (Art. 18) — each TSO must develop national terms for BSPs and BRPs, approved by the NRA
4. European balancing platforms — mandatory shared platforms for FRR and RR balancing energy exchange
5. Standard products — harmonized product definitions for cross-border balancing service exchange
6. 15-minute imbalance settlement (Art. 53) — mandatory for all TSOs
7. Demand response and aggregation rights (Art. 3.1.f) — demand flexibility and aggregated resources must compete on equal terms with generation

In the Swedish context, this regulation is most often referenced for its BSP role requirement — specifically Svk’s failure to implement a functional BSP role despite the December 2020 deadline in Art. 18.5.

Key provisions

Article 3 — Purpose and supervisory aspects

Art. 3.1.f (demand flexibility mandate): The regulation shall “facilitate participation of demand response, including aggregation of facilities and energy storage, and ensure they compete with other balancing services on equal terms and, where necessary, act independently when serving a single consumption facility.” This is the primary EU legal basis for demand-side equal treatment in balancing markets.

Art. 3.1.g: Facilitate participation of renewable energy sources.

Article 15 — TSO-DSO cooperation

TSOs must cooperate with DSOs on information needed for imbalance calculation (Art. 15.2). DSOs must report congestion limits that impact balancing (Art. 15.4, cross-referencing SO GL Art. 182). When drafting national balancing terms, TSOs must coordinate with affected DSOs (Art. 18.3.a).

Articles 16–17 — BSP and BRP roles

Art. 16 — BSP role: The BSP must submit capacity and energy bids covering units/groups in one or multiple BRP portfolios. No discrimination between different bid types. All units providing reserves must belong to the same planning area as their corresponding BRPs (Art. 16.8). Capacity may be transferred between BSPs (Art. 16.3).

Art. 17 — BRP role: BRPs must strive to maintain real-time balance in their electricity area. Financially liable for imbalances settled with the TSO. May modify timetables before intraday capacity allocation deadline.

Article 18 — National terms obligation (the BSP implementation article)

Art. 18 requires each TSO to propose national terms for BSPs and BRPs. These terms must include (Art. 18.5):

• a) Rules for how BRPs contribute to system balance (18.5.a)
• b) Settlement and billing procedures (18.5.b)
• c) Rules and conditions for aggregation of demand facilities, energy storage, and generation units to become a BSP (18.5.c) — this is the direct obligation that requires workable cross-BRP aggregation
• d) Information exchange requirements (18.5.d)
• e) Prequalification processes (18.5.e)
• f) Financial security requirements (18.5.f)

The terms are subject to NRA approval (Art. 5.4.c). TSOs must coordinate with affected DSOs during drafting (Art. 18.3.a). Implementation deadline for Swedish terms: December 2020 (12 months after the regulation entered into force in all EU member states). Svenska kraftnät‘s 2024 implementation (see Source - Svk Artikel 18 Villkor Balansering (2024)) is described by market actors as a “paper construction” — formally compliant but without the operational infrastructure for workable cross-BRP aggregation.

Articles 19–23 — European balancing platforms

Three mandatory European platforms:

• Replacement Reserves (RR) platform — Art. 19
• mFRR energy exchange platform — Art. 20
• aFRR energy exchange platform — Art. 21

All TSOs must participate. Enables cross-border balancing service trading. BSPs can offer services to TSOs in other planning areas via the TSO-TSO model (Art. 21.1.g).

Articles 25–30 — Standard products, activation, pricing

Art. 25–27 — Pricing:

• FCR energy: up-regulation priced at up-reg price; FCR-D activation not separately compensated
• aFRR energy: direction-dependent pricing (up-reg or down-reg price)
• mFRR energy: highest/lowest activation price ± 3 EUR/MWh; if none, day-ahead price ± 3 EUR/MWh

Art. 26 — Marginal pricing for aFRR: TSOs may use pay-as-cleared (marginal) or pay-as-bid; harmonization toward marginal pricing is the EU direction.

Art. 28–29 — Activation: Both scheduled activations (ahead-of-time) and direct activations are permitted for mFRR. Minimum volumes and timing rules to be set in national terms.

Article 53 — 15-minute imbalance settlement

Mandatory: all TSOs in all planning areas must implement 15-minute imbalance settlement periods. Deadline: three years from entry into force — i.e., by November 2020. Sweden’s 15-minute settlement is confirmed in Svk’s Art. 18 terms (Art. 4). This enables more granular price signals for flexible resources and accurate settlement of short DR activations.

Articles 44–55 — Imbalance settlement

BRP settlement (Art. 54): Imbalance = final position − allocated volume − imbalance adjustments. BRPs receive (or pay) the imbalance settlement price based on:

• VoAA (Value of Avoided Activation) — the average of cheapest available up-reg and most expensive available down-reg mFRR bids
• Incentive component — difference between day-ahead price and VoAA; ensures imbalance price ≈ day-ahead price when no activation occurs
• Balance reference price — VoAA + incentive component; applies when dominant direction is neutral

Aggregation and demand-side participation

The EB GL contains the EU’s explicit aggregation mandate for balancing markets. Key provisions:

The regulation is technology-neutral: generation, demand, and storage are explicitly equivalent for balancing service provision. A BSP acting as an aggregator earns revenue; affected BRPs are compensated separately (a compensation mechanism that Sweden has not yet fully implemented — see Aggregation and Elmarknadshubb).

Relationship to other regulations

Relevance to wiki topics

• Balancing Markets: EB GL is the primary legal basis for the Nordic FCR/aFRR/mFRR market structure; 15-minute settlement and marginal pricing derive from it
• Aggregation: Art. 3.1.f and 18.5.c are the EU legal basis for cross-BRP aggregation rights; the gap between this mandate and Svk’s implementation is the BSP problem
• Svenska kraftnät: Svk is directly bound by Art. 18; the 2024 terms document is its current (contested) implementation
• Elmarknadshubb: The centralt datahanteringsverktyg is the infrastructure prerequisite for the aggregation compensation mechanism required implicitly by Art. 18.5.c