FAQ
The energy sector can be quite complex. We try to make difficult language understandable. Below are some frequently asked questions.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Negative energy prices occur when there is a surplus of electricity and demand is low. This often happens with a lot of renewable energy production (such as solar and wind power) during periods of low demand, such as nights or weekends. Traditional power plants cannot always reduce their production fast enough, and storage capacity for excess energy is still often limited. This can create a situation where producers pay to sell their electricity, leading to negative energy prices. This phenomenon encourages investment in energy storage and flexible demand-side management.
Every day your expected power generation and consumption is predicted and submitted to the power company. This happens to everyone. The difference between what is tendered and what actually happens on the day is imbalance. The difference between these must be corrected. The market in which this happens is the imbalance energy market.
Fluctuating imbalance energy prices thus arise from differences between the predicted and actual supply and demand of electricity on the grid. Unforeseen events such as weather changes or power plant outages cause this imbalance. Network operators (such as Enexis, Liander, etc.) buy or sell electricity to restore the balance, leading to rapid price changes. Whether the bill for this reaches you as a customer depends on your energy contract
Curtailment of a solar installation means deliberately curtailing or completely shutting down the production of solar energy. This is done to avoid supplying power back at negative energy prices and thus having to pay for it. But also to avoid overloading the power grid when more power is produced than demanded. With Covolt's curtailment service, you no longer suffer but benefit from fluctuating energy prices.
A battery can be used for a variety of applications. Energy trading is one of them. Day markets like Imbalance and frequency markets like FCR are suitable energy markets for energy trading. For market access and a smart Energy Management System, you need an Aggregator partner like Covolt. Returns are achieved by charging energy when prices are low or below zero and discharging energy when prices are positive. The difference between these is called the spread and is the return achieved.
In the evening or at night, your business often needs less power than during the day. Once the workday begins, power consumption rises at many businesses. Sometimes with large peaks and troughs. For example, due to the start-up of production or the deployment of heavy equipment. This peak demand for power then potentially exceeds the capacity of your grid connection, which causes problems and can also result in penalties. A battery is a good solution for these scenarios. At the times when there is space, the battery is charged with energy. The stored energy is then supplied as additional power at times when it is needed during peak demand. In this way, you save on expanding your grid connection and still make execution of your business process possible. Smart control of your energy flows is essential for this.
Our power grid is full at many times. Companies are often on long waiting lists for a grid connection and contract power for feed-in electricity. By making smart use of the quieter moments, delivering solar energy is possible. That is what ZonBalans makes possible. How much you can deliver back depends on how powerful the sun is shining. Is the solar irradiance 50% or lower? Then you can deliver back unused solar generation. As soon as the solar power exceeds 50%, our software automatically switches off your system according to the rules of Enexis. This happens step by step. To qualify, you must be on the waiting list for extension of your connection and you must be located in Enexis territory. In short, with Zonbalans you can still deliver power back to the grid even though you do not yet have a contracted capacity for feed-in.
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