So 2012 is the best performing year for this platform, which is used by companies to trade energy through long-term contracts, with overall transactions of almost EUR740 million, three times higher than in 2011. A similar performance is expected this year. How did this occur?
According to ZF calculations based on data published on the website of the energy bourse, around 14.2 TWh was traded on the platform of bilateral contracts. This accounts for around one quarter of Romania’s energy consumption, worth almost 3.3 billion lei (around EUR740 million). But the actual boom of the energy market was recorded only in the last quarter of the year, when 188 transactions worth RON2.5 billion (EUR558 million) were sealed, involving 10.7 TWh of energy.
Basically around 75% of last year’s traded volumes were recorded in the last three months.
“Major state-run producers were very visible. Nuclearelectrica was present with around 4 TWh, Hidroelectrica with 2 TWh and Oltenia Energy Complex was also active. Several other smaller energy producers also came to the energy exchange,” explains Victor Ionescu, general manager of OPCOM.
There were several events last year that acted as incentives for trading through the energy exchange.
The Hidroelectrica effect
First of all, as major energy producer Hidroelectrica became insolvent in the middle of last year, several formerly loyal clients, which suddenly found themselves cut off from the cheapest source of energy in the country, entered the market. Companies such as Alpiq and Energy Holding, previously less active on the energy exchange, started trading after they lost their direct contracts with Hidroelectrica.
On the other hand, once it was rid of these contracts, Hidroelectrica brought the newly released amounts of energy to the energy bourse, where it managed to get the market price for it.
According to data centralized by ZF, in the last months of 2012 Hidroelectrica sold energy worth over RON460 million (EUR103 million) through over 40 transactions.
But Hidroelectrica’s insolvency was not the only trigger for energy trading through the bourse.
Positive effect of law
In July of last year the law of electricity and of natural gas was promulgated, which states that all market participants have to conclude bilateral transactions only in “centralized environments”, basically on the OPCOM exchange.
Although it created a lot of discontent on the market, especially from private companies, this provision was another driving factor for OPCOM trading.
Another incentive for energy transactions last year was the activation of the force majeure clause at Hidroelectrica because of the drought that affected the company’s energy production. This decision created room for nuclear power producer Nuclearelectrica and for thermal power producers.
After the performance of 2012, this year is also off to a good start, at least in terms of the transactions recorded on the spot market of OPCOM, the day ahead market (DAM).
“For delivery day January 1 there were 95 companies that traded on DAM, the peak interest since the 2005 launch of the new short-term trading mechanisms,” said OPCOM representatives.
OPCOM energy exchange is a subsidiary of energy transmission company Transelectrica and is fully controlled by Transelectrica.
(English version by Daniela Stoican)