At first glance, the swishing of the turbines at the Verenafohren wind farm in the border region to the north of the Swiss town of Schaffhausen is no different than that of other wind farms in Germany. The wind farm with an installed capacity of 9.9 MW is located just a few metres away from the Swiss border and is owned by the German company Hegauwind GmbH & Co. KG. What makes it so special: Since May 2017, the electricity that is generated there is fed into the Swiss grid and is marketed directly on the Swiss wholesale market by Alpiq.
Thus, Verenafohren is the first wind farm whose owners sell on their own responsibility the electricity generated directly on the Swiss wholesale market. Direct marketing means that the wind farm does not receive a fixed remuneration for each kilowatt hour generated, as it is the case with a feed-in tariff (FIT), but sells the generated electricity directly on the energy market at the current market price. The difference between the market price and the fixed remuneration is afterwards remunerated by the distribution grid operator.
As Alpiq bears the costs for the deviation between the forecast and what is actually fed into the grid, the so called balancing risk, the detailed local wind data and weather forecasts are permanently analysed, in order to simulate the most precise electricity generation expectations. Based on these forecasts, Alpiq continuously sells the generated electricity on the 24/7 intraday trading market.
Major step closer to the market
Direct marketing takes the electricity generated by wind power stations and photovoltaic systems a major step closer to the market. The marketing of renewable energies on the wholesale market is an important move on the path towards integrating them into the energy system of the future. With its flexible hydropower portfolio, Alpiq is optimally equipped to balance the fluctuating generation from wind and solar energy inside his portfolio.
As a service provider, Alpiq already markets more than 1,000 wind farms and photovoltaic systems on the German wholesale market. The company also integrates electricity from new renewable energy sources (wind, sun, biomass) in Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Italy and Spain in the market. In addition, as of summer 2017, Alpiq will also offer its many years of experience as a partner for the direct marketing of renewable energies in France.