What are ancillary services?

The term ancillary services is used to refer to a variety of operations beyond generation and transmission that are required to maintain grid stability and security. These services generally include active power control or frequency control and reactive power control or voltage control, on various timescales.

Which ancillary services are associated with opportunity costs?

From the generator point of view, the QMC can be associated with opportunity costs and incorporated into the payment function of Fig. 3. Active power reserves and reactive supply are the most common ancillary services in power systems.

How much do ancillary services cost?

Additionally, ancillary services are significant in the system’s budget. For example, in the United States the cost of these services was roughly estimated to be between 5% and 25% of total generation and transmission costs . Here, we separate the ancillary service costs as illustrated in Fig. 1.

How do ancillary services affect economics?

With the unbundling of ancillary services comes the necessity of determining how to pay the providers and charge the users. In this context, it is important to identify some aspects that influence the economics of these services: Ancillary service pricing: determining the price of a specific service.

What is agent-based ancillary service acquisition model?

The agent-based Ancillary Service Acquisition Model (ASAM) enables testing of various ancillary designs by simulations. In a use-case regarding redispatch designs in the Netherlands, it is shown that the framework and ASAM jointly enable the investigation of interactions of ancillary services and markets.