After a massive price surge on the power exchange, the Federal Network Agency is pointing to suspicious behavior. We are checking on that, said the agency’s head, Klaus Müller, to the Süddeutsche Zeitung (Saturday edition). “If there are indications of that, we would initiate further investigations.”
The prices had skyrocketed in the past few days due to a so-called dark cloud, reaching a peak of 936 euros per megawatt-hour on Thursday. The main reason was the very low feed-in of wind power.
The think tank Agora Energiewende sees an unusual occurrence on the market. On Thursday, coal and gas power plants with more than 8 gigawatts of capacity did not generate any power, although, according to EEX data, they were supposedly available, said Philipp Godron, head of the electricity program at Agora. “And although the generation would have been very lucrative at those high-price times.” They will not speculate on the reasons.
However, there was never a risk to the power supply in the country, Müller said. The question of potential blackouts can be answered “very clearly with no.” The agency’s monitoring is designed for such situations. Firstly, it is checked whether power is flowing over all border coupling points, that is, whether the technical grid structure is functioning, explained the head of the Federal Network Agency. And secondly, whether the supply is succeeding, including imports. “But of course, we take the events very seriously” said Müller.