Public consultation on the proposal to extend the validity of the Terms and Conditions applicable to providers of voltage and reactive power control service including the standard contract for the delivery of the voltage and reactive power control service (T&C VSP) for the contractual period 2022

Context

Elia submitted a first version of the Terms and Conditions for Voltage Service Providers (T&C VSP) for approval to the CREG in April 2020. This version was approved by the CREG for a period of 1 year, i.e. for the contractual period 2021.

After consultation with the CREG, Elia proposes to extend the validity of the T&C VSP for the contractual period 2022, which involves:

• organizing the next call for tender for the voltage and reactive power control service for the contract period 2022 on the basis of the T&C VSP currently in force, and
• a revision for the contractual period 2023 bringing together all the developments related to this service in a consolidated version of the T&C VSP.

This will allow to benefit from feedback from the application of the new design for this service throughout 2021, and to take into account comments from market players on the high number of amendments to regulated documents as well as the associated public consultations planned for 2021. This feedback will also make it possible to respond more effectively to the CREG's comments in its approval decision of the current version of the T&C VSP.  

The full implementation of the target design of the voltage and reactive power control service also requires a change in the legal framework (Article 12 quinquies of the Law of 29 April 1999 on the organization of the electricity market). Elia also hopes to be able to include the developments associated with such a change in the legal framework in the consolidated version of these T&C VSPs planned for the contractual period 2023.

Given that the CREG's approval decision on the T&C VSP currently in force is explicitly valid for the contractual period 2021, the application of these T&C VSP for the contractual period 2022 requires a new decision by the CREG. This requires prior public consultation.

Period

Elia invites all stakeholders to submit any comments and suggestions they may have on the proposal submitted for consultation.

The consultation period runs from Tuesday 2nd of February  to Monday 22th of February. Elia’s proposal is presented to the market parties during the Working Group Balancing on the 29 January 2021 and the Working Group Belgian Grid on the 10 February 2021.

After the consultation period, Elia collects all comments and feedback from the market parties. Elia will analyse these comments and integrate them into a consultation report together with Elia’s responses. In addition to the consultation report, Elia will publish the reactions of the market parties (including names) on the website, unless it is explicitly stated that the contribution is to be considered confidential.