News
05 Oct 2021, 12:04
Kerstine Appunn

German grid agency fines traders for electricity market manipulation

Clean Energy Wire

The German Federal Network Agency (BNetzA) has imposed fines of 200,000 euros on Energi Danmark and 175,000 euros on Optimax Energy for market manipulation in the wholesale electricity market. In June 2019, the two traders were selling electricity on the energy exchange EPEX Spot although the electricity offered was not available and there was no intention to procure or generate it, the BNetzA said in a press release. As a result, significant imbalances occurred in the German electricity grid on three days in June 2019, requiring transmission grid operators to deploy balancing energy for extended periods of time and implement other measures to keep the system stable – which they succeeded in doing. "Dangerous under-coverage of balancing groups must not be allowed to pay off. Anyone who pockets profits at the expense of system stability is acting unlawfully," says BNetzA vice president Peter Franke. After an extensive analysis of the trading data, the BNetzA found eight counts of manipulative trading behaviour by Energi Danmark and seven counts by Optimax Energy.

The fines are not yet legally binding. The Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court will decide on possible appeals.

All texts created by the Clean Energy Wire are available under a “Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence (CC BY 4.0)” . They can be copied, shared and made publicly accessible by users so long as they give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made.
« previous news next news »

Ask CLEW

Sören Amelang

Researching a story? Drop CLEW a line or give us a call for background material and contacts.

Get support

+49 30 62858 497

Journalism for the energy transition

Get our Newsletter
Join our Network
Find an interviewee