Utility Week

UTILITY WEEK | FEBRUARY 2021 | 37 Operational Excellence Analysis Strength in simplicity Jan Ydens, head of product for Kiwi Power, talks to Tom Grimwood about the company's role in WPD's Flexible Power platform and the importance of simplicity in an increasingly complex energy market. I n October, four of the six distribution network operators (DNOs) in Great Brit- ain – SP Energy Networks, Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks, Northern Powergrid and Western Power Distribution (WPD) – announced they would hence- forth conduct all of their flexibility tenders through a single, joint marketplace – a revamped version of the Flexible Power plat- form developed and already in use by WPD. Energy technology company and aggrega- tor Kiwi Power has been involved in the Flex- ible Power project since its inception. Jan Ydens, the firm's head of product, describes it as "a real milestone" for the sec- tor "to have four DNOs adopt a common plat- form for procuring, managing and operating flexibility". He says WPD wanted to develop an "end- to-end" process from market design to flex- ibility procurement to operations: "That last piece is where Kiwi Power delivers real value. We believe the proposition created is quite unique for DNOs. Until recently a lot of attention and effort has been on market design and flexibility procurement while the operational aspects have gone largely unaddressed, which is where this solution focuses. "And that, I think, plays to Kiwi Power's expertise from years of operating flexibility from the transmission-level programmes with National Grid and further afield." "This is not something that DNOs have needed to be well practised in until recently," he adds. "And it's no easy task. "The challenges range from identifying operational requirements closer to real time to process design, data management, identi- fying energy resources and managing those." Nevertheless, Ydens says WPD has "very quickly" moved from innovation to business- as-usual: "While it was a piece of work pio- neered by their innovation team, it's now all part of their regular day-to-day operat- ing processes. They have teams dedicated to managing this programme and we're in the process of onboarding other DNOs on to the platform." He says bringing the other DNOs onboard has so far required "very little" in the way of adaption: "The functionality could stay unchanged; we just had to change the branding and website to reflect it being a truly shared platform." "Kiwi Power has grown rapidly over the past decade," he explains. "Operating glob- ally in different markets, jurisdictions and regions – each one of those has its own characteristics and changing on different timescales – requires a platform that is very adaptable and flexible." One for all and all for one Ydens believes one of the big benefits of a joint flexibility marketplace is the standardi- sation it will bring for providers: "There is a push that I've witnessed all the way from BEIS [the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy] and Ofgem through to the Energy Networks Association through to the DNOs themselves about trying to standardise these services and make it easier for flexibility suppliers to participate. "In the early days, each of the DNOs was doing something slightly different and unique – they had different programmes, they had very different procurement cycles, their market design was different, the con- tracts themselves were different – and I think we've just seen that general push, par- ticularly on the procurement side, towards standardisation. "As a logical next step, I think now we're starting to see standardisation on the opera- tional side of things." He continues: "I think one of the real strengths of the overall market design and our technology is that we've always tried to keep things as simple as they can be. I think through that simplicity, it makes it much easier for the flexibility providers to participate." "My view is that the complexity of the energy market is one of the biggest barriers to entry to potential flexibility providers, par- ticularly those who are unfamiliar with the industry," he remarks. "The industry is complex enough and I believe there's a significant risk that digitisa- tion of the industry will only further compli- cate matters. A key tenet of our philosophy and decision-making process is keep it sim- ple. Standardisation is part of that." Ydens also says the solution is generating a lot of international interest. "The UK is a leading and innovative flexibility market and markets overseas are looking at the UK, see- ing what's being done here and looking to emulate that." he says. "There are a lot of projects in America try- ing to tackle this same problem. Not many of them have been very successful to date at getting past the innovation stage, and that's partly regulations that prevent that." Giving a nod to the regulator, he says Ofgem and their RIIO price controls are "o›en cited as a key enabler". Going forward, Ydens says the company's work will be characterised by "incremen- tal change, continuous improvement". This includes streamlining the transition between procurement, contracting and operations: "At the moment, the procurement is done online. Then it's a bit of an offline process for contracting and then online again for operations." He says there are also the challenges of generating and leveraging data – "getting data, making that data available to others who can continue to innovate" – as well as warding off cyber-security threats, which will "only ever increase". Tom Grimwood, energy editor

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