Northern Powergrid’s Long Term Summer Tender
This summer NPg will be tendering for demand turn down / generation turn up Scheduled Utilisation flexibility services for winter 2025/26 and winter 2026/27. This includes several zones that are new to the market.
NPg expects to procure 9 MW for 2025/26 across 7 high voltage (HV) zones and 13 low voltage (LV) zones, rising to 13MW in 2026/27. The requirements published here are indicative. The actual requirements to be tendered will be confirmed in July. These indicative requirements are published now as visibility-only competitions to give potential participants a view of the anticipated zones and revenue potential.
The NPg tender timetable for 2025/26 is designed to enable more flexibility service providers (FSPs) to participate in their market by allowing more time between signposting requirements and tender participation deadlines, as requested by FSPs. This announcement is the start of their extended signposting period prior to the long-term tender in the summer.
The summer tender will be followed by a series of monthly, month-ahead tenders during the autumn and winter of 2025/26 to top up the flexibility capacity as required for winter 2025/26. In those monthly tenders NPg will be procuring the Operational Utilisation + Scheduled Availability product which will be dispatched week ahead.
You can view the competition areas, determine their potential value and assess how many of your assets would be eligible from your Piclo Max dashboard. All further information can be found in the Documentation tab or email Northern Powergrid (flexibility@northernpowergrid.com)
Our Autumn tender is now live.
We are seeking to procure 1.5 MW across two high voltage (HV) zones and 13 low voltage (LV) zones for winter 24/25 and winter 25/26. This includes a number of zones that are new to the market: the Starbeck HV zone and ten LV zones.
This year we have delivered an enhanced process for forecasting network constraints that gives us more tightly defined service windows, maximising the £/MWh value of flexibility services. We have also delivered a revised approach to pricing LV network constraints. The effect of these on our requirements for LV zones has been significant and created added value through bespoke service windows and bespoke and higher ceiling prices per LV zone.
We are excited to bring these new and higher value opportunities to the market.
Additionally, we are looking for expressions of interest at a further 11 primary substation locations for years starting from 2025/26 through to 2028/29, in order to understand future availability of capacity at these sites. These competitions will be described as ‘visibility only’ on Piclo.
Please visit the ‘Documentation’ tab for more information and view the competitions on the Piclo dashboard.
Bidding has closed in the Summer tender. We’ll soon be publishing our invitation to tender for the Autumn 2024 tender.
Update on flexibility capacity requirements for Summer tender
Now that we have awarded contracts in our Spring 2024 tender, we can confirm the detailed capacity requirements for the Summer tender.
A reminder of the timetable for the Summer tender:
For information on how to participate in our flexibility tender, please scroll down to our previous announcement.
June 28, 2024
Update on Northern Powergrid Summer 2024 tender
Summary of flexibility needs
How to participate in our flexibility tender
Step 1: If you’re new to Piclo Flex, please create an account. Once you have created an account, we recommend that you upload your flexibility assets. Find out more about uploading assets here.
Step 2: If your organisation is not already pre-qualified to provide flexibility services to Northern Powergrid, you should apply for company qualification before the Dynamic Procurement System (DPS) closes. Find out more about the DPS Application here.
Step 3: Once you have passed company qualification and uploaded assets in competition zones, you will be ready to complete company qualification; i.e. to confirm entry of assets into the competitions you wish to bid into.
Step 4: Submit a bid during the bidding window. Find out more details about submitting a bid here.When the ITT is published, this will include an Instructions to Bidders document and we recommend that you read this carefully.In the meantime, we're very happy to chat with new or existing providers of flexibility services.
If you have any questions or would like to set up a 1-2-1 meeting with one of our team, email us at flexibility@northernpowergrid.com.Email support@picloflex.com for help with setting up your account or using the Piclo platform.
New DSO flexibility opportunities available via Piclo!
Key dates:
What next?
Step 1: If you are new to Piclo Flex then create an account. After an account has been created, we recommend you upload relevant assets. Find out more about uploading assets on this page. Existing flex providers, please go to Step 3
Step 2: If your organisation is not already pre-qualified to provide flexibility services to Northern Powergrid, you should apply for company qualification before the DPS closes at noon on Wednesday 10 April. Find out more about the DPS application on this page.
Step 3: If you are intending to bid, you will need to confirm entry and ensure your assets are eligible to participate by noon on 16 May. The bidding window opens on Friday, 17 May 2024 and closes at noon on Monday, 03 June.
We are happy to chat with new or existing flexibility service providers. If you have any questions or would like to set up a 1-2-1 meeting with one of our team, email us at flexibility@northernpowergrid.com. Contact support@picloflex.com for help with setting up your account.
We are happy to announce that we are making excellent progress with our preparations to launch our Spring 2024 tender round. We aim to share the details of the locations and capacities we are seeking for Flexibility Services later in February.
However, interested parties should register for DPS now in readiness of our Spring 2024 competitions. Find out how to register your DPS here.
Bidders please download the ITT Procurement Documents listed in the Documentation tab.
Northern Powergrid will also shortly be calling for flexibility service providers to participate in its Autumn 2023 flexibility tender to provide flexibility between December 2023 & March 2024, and October 2024 & March 2025.
We have DSO flexibility opportunities on Piclo Flex now!
Additionally, Northern Powergrid is calling for expressions of interest from flexibility service providers to provider flexibility from Winter 2027/2028
Step 1
Create a Piclo Flex account and complete the Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS) application by 16 October. If you haven’t already, you’ll need to upload your asset data onto the Piclo Flex platform
Step 2
Complete the asset upload and confirm entry on Piclo Flex platform by 24 October 2023. Competition will open on 31 October and close on 07 November.
We’ll be in touch to let you know if you’ve been pre-qualified by 04 December 2023. Those that successfully pass the pre-qualification stage can proceed to the Competition stage
In the meantime, we're very happy to chat with FSPs so if you have any questions or would like to set up a 1-2-1 meeting with one of our team, email us at flexibility@northernpowergrid.com. Email support@picloflex.com for help with setting up your account.
Details of the indicative requirements for our Summer 2025 tender are set out in the files below. The list of zones is anticipated and subject to revision.
The indicative service windows areas follows:
The actual requirements to be tendered will be confirmed in July including zones, capacity required, service windows and maximum budget.
Postcode data is provided for each zone as well as GeoJSON files. However, please be aware that the map areas drawn on the Piclo dashboard use the GeoJSON files as this defines the zone areas more accurately than postcode data can.
We use the latest version of the industry standard contract for flexibility services. As part of the commercial prequalification process, you will be asked to review and sign this contract. The executed contract then operates as an overarching contract so that multiple trade awards can be made under this agreement. You will be asked to sign two identical contracts, one with Northern Powergrid (Northeast) plc and one with Northern Powergrid (Yorkshire) plc. The Northeast contract is available here for your review
For more information on Northern Powergrid’s flexibility activities:
We are procuring the Scheduled Utilisation product to manage demand constrained areas of our network, so we are looking of either demand turn down or generation turn up
We will consider bids from assets already connected and also from those in development. However, we are using these services to ensure network security, therefore during our bid assessment phase we will consider the validity and certainty of projects and may require development milestones within the Flexibility Services Contract.
Note: any asset may need to be available for testing at least one month prior to the first service window.
Performance will be monitored using meter data from meters at the site.
Each solution should have metering with half-hourly resolution or higher. Metering should meet the accuracy requirements of the relevant Code of Practice at the time of installation (https://www.elexon.co.uk/bsc-and-codes/bsc-related-documents/codes-of-practice/).
There are a number of baseline options.
We will use a baseline methodology that is mutually acceptable to both us and the flexibility services provider.
Please refer to our baselining methodology and workbook which can be found here.
The revenues vary by location. Please refer to individual competitions for location-specific information.
We are happy to have face-to-face discussions with our flexibility services stakeholders. To arrange this or to ask for assistance with any queries relating to our procurement and use of flexibility services please email: flexibility@northernpowergrid.com.
Email us at flexibility@northernpowergrid.com to sign up to our mailing list.
We welcome feedback from all stakeholders. Please e-mail us at flexibility@northernpowergrid.com with any comments or questions.