On Christmas Eve 2022, the time had come: the German Federal Government required the Federal Network Agency, system operators, electricity supply companies, distribution and transmission system operators to implement the StromPBG (Electricity Price Brake Act) in practice and to establish all necessary processes and interfaces using suitable StromPBG portals in order to ensure compliance with the statutory reporting obligations – including TransnetBW GmbH, which operates the electricity transmission grid in Baden-Württemberg. This was preceded by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in violation of international law, which caused energy prices to skyrocket. The situation on the markets was dramatic. The electricity price brake provided a remedy. The tense situation on the energy markets and the uncertainty among end customers were not the only explosive factors. It was also a major challenge to get the reporting portal live within a very short period of time and within an unalterable legal timeframe. TransnetBW succeeded with the expert IT and industry knowledge of PTA IT-Beratung, headquartered in Mannheim.
TransnetBW fulfills legal reporting obligations with StromPBG portal
User-friendly and productive in record time
Company portrait
TransnetBW GmbH operates the electricity transmission grid in Baden-Württemberg. The transmission system operator thus secures the electricity supply in the region, in Germany and in Europe. Numerous electricity traders, power plant and distribution grid operators in Germany and abroad are among TransnetBW’s customers and partners. Maximum voltage around the clock, continuously stable at a frequency of 50 Hertz – this is the company’s high standard for secure and trouble-free grid operation.
This demanding task is carried out by around 1,500 employees and 220 and 380 kV circuits with a length of 3,111 kilometers over an area of around 34,600 km². Around 80 transformers connect TransnetBW’s transmission grid with the distribution grids in Baden-Württemberg. In this way, the transmission system operator ensures the secure transmission of electricity for internationally important industrial companies and more than 11 million people in Baden-Württemberg – reliably and around the clock. In this way, TransnetBW secures the economic power and quality of life in southwest Germany.
Extraordinary market dynamics meet complex regulation
The energy industry was already seeing significantly higher prices on the European electricity markets at the end of 2021. And the situation on the electricity markets came to a head at the beginning of 2022 at the latest with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in violation of international law: gas supplies from Russia to Germany were completely cut off and the price of gas rose significantly due to the shortage of gas supplies. As a result, the electricity generation costs, i.e. the costs incurred for converting gas into electricity, skyrocketed at gas-fired power plants.
This had far-reaching consequences: As gas-fired power plants have the highest costs when generating electricity, they determine the electricity price on the exchange according to the merit order principle in the hours in which they are used to produce electricity. As a result, German and European exchange electricity prices rose sharply in 2022. At the same time, the sharp rise in exchange electricity prices led to so-called surplus revenues at other electricity generation plants, such as wind and solar power plants, which have much lower electricity generation costs. While end customers are therefore disproportionately burdened by the high electricity prices, operators of electricity generation plants with low electricity generation costs are recording disproportionately high profits.
Legislative initiative: Electricity price brake to provide a quick remedy
In order to remedy this very tense situation for end consumers, the European Commission adopted a regulation on emergency measures for high energy prices at the beginning of October 2022. Based on these requirements, the German government drew up the Electricity Price Control Act (StromPBG), which came into force on Christmas Eve 2022. In principle, the StromPBG provides for the skimming off of surplus revenues from power plant operators and using these revenues to relieve end consumers of the increased electricity costs. To this end, the legislator has made the Federal Network Agency, plant operators, electricity supply companies, distribution and transmission system operators responsible for implementing the StromPBG in practice. TransnetBW, which operates the transmission grid in the southwest of Germany, was also directly affected by this. “The StromPBG has obliged us to set up a suitable portal for the corresponding reporting processes within a very short period of time and with unalterable time windows, which covers all the necessary processes and interfaces in the most user-friendly way possible,” says Marian Bilger, one of the TransnetBW customer managers responsible for the StromPBG portal, describing the initial situation.
Speed and process expertise were in demand
The objective of this IT project was therefore clearly defined and ambitious due to the short, tough legal implementation deadlines. And this is precisely where the support of PTA, a trusted implementation partner for many years, came in handy. The IT specialists from Mannheim have been working with the transmission system operator for many years on the basis of trust and partnership.
Since 2001, they have developed portals for TransnetBW in connection with the Act on the Maintenance, Modernization and Expansion of Combined Heat and Power Generation (KWKG portal) and the Act on the Expansion of Renewable Energies (EEG portal), among other things, and have also been entrusted with the support of these reporting portals ever since. Thanks to their many years of expertise and in-depth knowledge of TransnetBW’s core systems and processes, the transmission system operator was also able to go live with the StromPBG portal in the short time available with the active support of the IT consultants from Mannheim.
Logic 1: The new portal relieves the burden on end consumers
In order to cover the complex reporting obligations on the portal side and comply with the logic of the StromPBG, the project managers had to support and map two aspects on the IT side: the so-called relief side and the skimming side. The relief side had to be implemented within a very short period of time at the turn of the year 2022/2023 and go live at the beginning of 2023. This affects all electricity supply companies (EltVUs) and other end consumers. This involves a total of around 400 companies or individuals in TransnetBW’s control area. After a thorough examination, the project participants realized that the relief side of the new StromPBG portal must basically cover the same processes and players as TransnetBW has already established for the billing of the EEG surcharge, only with the payment direction reversed. “The option of being able to fall back on the processes established for the EEG was a huge advantage under the existing time pressure. The IT professionals at PTA supported us with their comprehensive industry knowledge and in-depth process consulting,” explains David Kaiser, who is responsible for the relief side of the StromPBG at TransnetBW.
The right data entry forms pave the way for implementation
The PTA consultants quickly created the appropriate data entry forms with complex validation rules to avoid input errors. This enabled the EltVUs and other end consumers concerned to submit all the information required for the discharge in good time. Incomplete, incorrect or implausible information was avoided thanks to the extensive input checks. In this way, it was possible to pay out the relief amounts to all eligible EltVUs and other end consumers on time and in accordance with the law, ultimately enabling all electricity consumers to benefit from the statutory cap on the electricity price.
Project ID: 6221
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Logic 2: StromPBG portal records surplus revenue on the absorption side
The portal was completed by integrating the necessary processes on the levy side, one of the financing bases of the electricity price brake. Although the levy side had somewhat more generous deadlines with regard to the go-live, it was also considerably more complex to implement. All operators of levy-relevant electricity generation plants are affected. In the TransnetBW control area, this involved a total of around 500 plant operators. The StromPBG provides for the following mechanism for determining and skimming off surplus revenues, which must be mapped in TransnetBW’s StromPBG portal: In the first step, the connection grid operators of the installations relevant for skimming off the surplus will notify the address data of the installation operators to the responsible transmission system operator by 31.03.2023. The system operators recorded in this way are then requested by the latter to register in the StromPBG portal and comply with the statutory reporting obligations there. Electricity generation plants subject to the levy are primarily larger plants that generate electricity from renewable energies – i.e. larger wind turbines and photovoltaic plants, hydropower plants and biomass plants, but also waste-to-energy plants and nuclear power plants (Neckarwestheim II in Baden-Württemberg until April 2023). Hard coal and gas-fired power plants are excluded; there are no lignite-fired power plants in Baden-Württemberg.
Customer testimonial
“TransnetBW’s StromPBG portal has been a real success in terms of usability, performance, clarity and the presentation of results. The project managers have implemented it in a very user-friendly way,
Steffen Hailer, Head of Asset Trading at EnBW AG, is impressed by the intuitive operation of the portal and the presentation of complex issues.
The electricity price brake takes effect
With the new StromPBG portal, TransnetBW has the tool it needs to meet the legal requirements and reporting obligations on time. The portal is characterized by a high level of user-friendliness. Thanks to the in-depth expertise of PTA’s IT consultants, all the necessary processes went live on time despite the very tight schedule. The transmission system operator thus fulfills the central idea of the electricity price brake: electricity consumers are relieved financially and on the levy side, the portal enables the affected plant operators to calculate the surplus revenue to be transferred to the affected connection system operators and to transmit all the necessary information required for the downstream review by the Federal Network Agency. “Together with our long-standing implementation partner PTA, we have not only implemented the technical requirements within a very short time. We have also provided the users of our new StromPBG portal with a clear and easy-to-use solution that allows them to submit their reports quickly and easily,” summarizes Marian Bilger.
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