The trading of flexibility on the intraday market was previously reserved for industrial providers such as large power plants. sonnen and ESFORIN are now opening up this market to private households in Germany for the first time, thereby leveraging previously untapped potential for the energy transition.
ESSEN/WILDPOLDSRIED June 22, 2022 - The energy solution provider sonnen, together with the flexibility specialist ESFORIN, is now using the sonnenBatteries of private customers for intraday electricity trading. sonnen is making the home storage systems, which are networked to form a virtual power plant (sonnenVPP), available to the sonnenCommunity in Germany. The prerequisite for participation in intraday trading is the intelligent electricity tariff sonnenFlat.
ESFORIN, in turn, uses algotrading to digitally market the available energy volumes from the battery storage systems on the intraday market of the European power exchange EPEX Spot SE. This is fully automated and takes place with the help of individual algorithms and artificial intelligence. The marketing of the networked, decentralized home storage systems not only stabilizes the electricity grid based on the market, but also enables the integration of additional renewable electricity generation. In this way, members of the sonnenCommunity make an important additional contribution to the energy transition and to reducing CO2 emissions without the need for additional investment.
In intraday trading, electricity suppliers can cover their additional requirements at short notice or sell surpluses. This instrument can be used to precisely balance electricity supply and demand. Until now, this form of trading has only been used by industrial suppliers, but sonnen and ESFORIN are now making it available to members of the sonnen community - i.e. private households - for the first time as another fundamental innovation for the energy transition.
"We are once again sending a clear signal for the digitalization of the energy transition. With the sonnenBatteries networked into a virtual power plant, we can now buy or sell electricity on the energy market in a targeted manner and thus shift generation or consumption peaks in a time and price-optimized manner," says Oliver Koch, CEO of sonnen, adding: "The sonnenBattery becomes an intelligent purchasing manager for electricity and ensures that free storage capacity is used efficiently. This helps us to continue to offer our customers favorable electricity prices via sonnenFlat".
Due to the expansion of renewable energies as well as the increasing number of electric cars and heat pumps, electricity generation and consumption are fluctuating more and more. Storage and intelligent balancing mechanisms for electricity flexibility therefore play a decisive role in the stability of the electricity grids. The market price can provide an important economic incentive for grid-friendly behavior. If a lot of electricity is available from solar or wind power, prices are lower. If they are absent, the price rises and electricity becomes more valuable.
"With the help of our proven flexibility marketing, private households networked in the sonnenCommunity can react to the current availability of electricity for the first time ever and in real time, thus helping to stabilize the electricity grid and reduce CO2 emissions," says Christian Hövelhaus, CEO of ESFORIN, emphasizing: "This means that households are providing previously untapped potential for the energy transition - without any loss of comfort or further investment."
In simple terms, participation in daily electricity trading looks like this: If too much wind power is currently being produced, the sonnenBatteries can be increasingly charged with low-priced and low-CO2 electricity. The stored electricity is used in the household and therefore does not have to be purchased when prices are higher again.
If, on the other hand, there is too much solar power available, the prices are correspondingly low. The surplus solar power generated by sonnenCommunity members is then preferably stored in the sonnenBatteries instead of being fed into the grid. Solar feed-in is thus shifted to times when prices are higher.
Customers with the sonnenFlat electricity contract participate in intraday trading by receiving an amount of free electricity based on the size of their PV system and the capacity of their sonnenBattery. Because they are part of the sonnenVPP, they receive a share of the profits from the proceeds of the virtual power plant - the "VPP Bonus". Intraday trading is an additional mechanism that sonnen now uses to offer customers the most favorable conditions possible. The cheaper sonnen can purchase the electricity that is not covered by the sonnenCommunity's own generation, the better conditions the sonnenFlat can offer customers. The same applies if sonnen can achieve higher revenues for the electricity that the sonnenCommunity does not need.
Until now, sonnen has mainly used its virtual power plant sonnenVPP for primary control reserve (FCR). With the expansion of its virtual power plant for intraday trading, sonnen is now continuing its strategy of using electricity storage beyond pure self-consumption and thus achieving additional benefits for customers as well as for the energy transition. At the same time, for the first time, household customers are using sonnen's virtual power plant to make targeted use of their electricity flexibility on the intraday trading market via the ESFORIN marketing platform.
About ESFORIN SE
ESFORIN (Energy Services for Industry) is the leading provider of digital flexibility marketing in the energy sector. Founded in 2014 by experienced energy entrepreneurs, the company currently employs over 40 people and operates a sophisticated automated trading infrastructure serving leading industrial and energy-intensive customers, municipal utilities, renewable generators and batteries. ESFORIN is headquartered in Essen and serves customers in Germany, Austria, the Netherlands and the UK. In 2021, the company processed 3.9 million trades on EPEX Spot and generated revenue of EUR 275 million.
About sonnen
sonnen is one of the world's leading manufacturers of intelligent electricity storage systems and a pioneer in technologies for a clean, decentralized and networked energy system. As a fast-growing technology company, sonnen has already won numerous international awards for its innovations. With the sonnenCommunity, sonnen unites all customers into a globally unique energy community. Through sonnen's virtual power plant, the company offers completely new and highly innovative energy services for grid operators and private households. sonnen is represented with its products in numerous countries and has its own sites in Germany, Italy, Australia and the USA. sonnen is a wholly owned subsidiary of Shell and is part of the Renewables and Energy Solutions business unit.
Press Reports
HANDELSBLATT "How to sell your own solar power on the stock exchange"
Press Contact
Theodora Trah | theodora.trah@esforin.com
