Winter 2016/2017 TRIAD Periods

This week National Grid announced the three Triad periods for winter 2016/2017.

Triads are the three half hour settlement periods with the highest average demand between the months of November and February, separated by at least ten full days.

Despite a perceived surge in energy intensive users working hard to avoid winter peak period costs, all three of them occurred between the hours of 5.00 and 5.30pm this time.

This follows a perceived trend from last year, when business users were caught out, when one of the Triad events happened at 6.30pm.

Following the release of these times, we can see that these times have reverted back to previously predictable patterns, with all the triads happening between 5.00pm and 5:30pm this time . With two events happening on a Monday, which statistically is the most common day for these Triad events. The third event occurred on a Thursday which surprisingly again is statistically the second most common date for a Triad event.  With none of these events happening in November or February, instead all 3 occurred in December and January.  In fact the three Triads all occurred between 5.00-5.30 on the following days:

  • 5th December 2016 (50,163MWh GB demand)
  • 5th January 2017 (48,516MWh GB demand)
  • 23rd January 2017 (48,970MWh GB demand)

Load Shifting – Peak Demand Avoidance

Although red band DUoS charges are set to reduce from April 2018, TNUoS charges are set to increase, and when combined with the additional capacity market charges, it’s never been so costly to use power during these peak time periods.

This backdrop of increasing non-commodity charges presents the perfect platform to explore demand management services, and understand how and what can be turned down during these high peak cost periods.  For those organisation that can also benefit from demand side response (DSR) services not only can they reduce load during these high price point periods, they can also generate an additional revenue source from helping the grid balance supply and demand during these peak periods.

Preparing for next winter and beyond takes time, and organisations should be making plans now to understand what is the right type of DSR scheme that will provide the most benefit to an organisation.

Catalyst can help you cut through the jargon, as we work with a multitude of commercial aggregators of the National Grid Demand-Side Response schemes we can provide full access to the different types of schemes now available.