The organised electricity market is hierarchically arranged into a Balance Scheme. Any legal or natural person that wishes to actively operate on the electricity market must become a member of the Balance Scheme.
Balance Scheme Members
Balance Scheme Members can act on the market as:
- traders who buy or sell electricity according to volumes known in advance (closed contracts), or
- suppliers of electricity who, besides electricity trading, also deal with electricity supply to consumers or with electricity purchase from producers (open contracts).
Other Members of the Balance Scheme
The transmission system operator, distribution system operator and energy exchange are also Balance Scheme Members. Besides that, the Centre for support has established one or more eco (sub)groups with special status in the Balance Scheme in accordance with the regulations in force. An eco group is designed for the settlement of differences between announced and realised production and sale of electricity, gathered from participants of the support scheme who are entitled to guaranteed purchase.
Balancing Agreements
Membership and structure of the Balance Scheme are defined with the Balancing Agreements concluded with the Power Market Operator and with Compensation Agreements concluded with the Balance Scheme Members. The Power Market Operator, which represents the peak of the Balance Scheme, provides balancing energy delivery to the Balance Groups through Balancing Agreements. The transmission System Operator, Elektro Slovenia d.o.o., physically implements the balancing of the electric power system.The Power Market Operator is responsible for keeping, updating, and publishing the record of balance scheme membership contracts on its website. The record of balance scheme membership contracts is a register of validly registered Balancing Agreements and Compensation Agreements, whose constitutive parts are the list of the Balance Scheme Members and the Balance Scheme itself. The Market Operator publishes the list of the Balance Scheme Members on its website.
Entering the Balance Scheme
Before the Balance Group or Balance Subgroup is actually registered, the Market Operator verifies its compliance with the conditions for entry in the register. If the Market Participant wishes to report a closed contract on the purchase or sale of electricity and an operational forecast of the supply and production of appurtenant delivery points to the Market Operator, inclusion into the Balance Scheme is required.
Market Participants may be included to the Balance Scheme in two ways: