(01 December 2014) – The winter outlook analysis, carried out by the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity (ENTSO-E), shows that in general Europe has sufficient generation for both normal and severe demand conditions. While various countries may require imports, cross border capacity is expected to be mostly sufficient to accommodate them.
Under severe conditions, several countries need imports to fulfil their peak load throughout the winter: Albania, Denmark, Finland, Hungary, Latvia, Macedonia, Poland, Serbia and Sweden. Furthermore, the situation in the coming winter could be potentially stressed in certain periods for the Belgian system due to the shut down of three nuclear units for safety reasons.
In France and Belgium, measures have been put in place including contracted emergency load reduction measures and contracted strategic reserves in order to mitigate potential adequacy risks for coming winter.
A study carried out by TSOs and Regional Security Coordination Initiatives revealed that given the expected particular situation for next winter, additional countermeasures at regional level might be required to ensure a secure operation of the power system.