What benefits can be gained by coupling markets across borders and across multiple energy carriers?

As early as 2006, the countries of France, Belgium, and the Netherlands laid the foundation for European electricity market coupling by connecting their day-ahead electricity markets. Since then, the EU’s efforts to establish a pan-European internal electricity market have come a long way. The European internal electricity market is not limited to day-ahead trading but also includes, for example, the balancing power markets. Linking the markets increases the volumes traded and usually has economic advantages. In addition to the geographic coupling of markets, there are also increasing interdependencies between electricity, balancing power, and other energy markets. The interdependencies of the markets are becoming more complex, and the analyses of the added value of coupling are becoming increasingly exciting.

Specifically, we look at the following questions:

• European coupling vs. decentralization
• What are the interdependencies between electricity, gas, and heat markets and future hydrogen markets?
• What are the dependencies between spot and balancing power markets?
• What effects did the market decoupling DE-AT have?
• What are the benefits of European market coupling?