Hogan, William. Western Energy Imbalance Market: an Efficient Market with Conflicting Carbon Policies (January 8, 2018)

Organized electricity markets often require submission of supply functions ahead of the realization of uncertain demand. As a model of oligopoly behavior, the Nash condition of supply function equilibrium has a natural appeal. Typically this produces a continuum of possible equilibria, presenting an equilibrium selection problem. Beyond existence, stability of an equilibrium would be an obvious criterion for selection. For affine demand and marginal costs, polynomial approximation provides an approach for analyzing the stability of unconstrained supply function equilibria. The set of stable approximation equilibria is small and its properties suggest that the set of stable exact supply function equilibria is empty.

Hogan, William. Maintaining Reliability in a Competitive Electricity Market. Draft. 26-27 October 1995. Presentation.

Executive Summary:

Electricity markets employ open access and non‐discrimination to foster competition, market entry, and innovation.    The physical characteristics of the electricity system require explicit consideration of key elements in electricity market design.  Pricing and settlement rules for the real‐time market must provide efficient incentives, both for short‐term operations and long‐run investment. The ERCOT energy‐only market design emphasizes the need to get the real‐time prices right.    The recent innovation of the ERCOT Operating Reserve Demand Curve (ORDC) addressed the fundamental problem of inadequate region‐wide scarcity pricing that has plagued other organized markets, which have exhibited inadequate incentives both for reliable operations and efficient investment. 

ERCOT employs an open wholesale electricity market as the basis for short‐term reliable electricity supply as well as for long‐term investments to maintain reliability in the future.  A review of energy price formation in ERCOT leads to two important conclusions: (i) while the ORDC is performing consistently within its design, scarcity price formation is being adversely influenced by factors not contemplated by the ORDC; (ii) other aspects of the ERCOT market design must be improved to better maintain private market response to energy prices as the driver of resource investment, maintenance expenditure and retirement decisions.   

The paper identifies three general issues that have affected ERCOT energy prices in recent years, and recommends policy and price formation improvements consistent with efficient market design. These recommendations cannot reverse the impact of broader economic trends, such as low natural gas prices, or national policies, such as subsidies for investments in renewable resources.  However, the stress of these forces has exposed areas where there is a need for adjustments to pricing rules and policies within ERCOT.  

Hogan, William. Illustrating two models of locational operating reserve demand curves. Presentation to the Harvard Electricity Policy Group, October 1, 2009. 62 pages.

Hogan, William. Externalities and Incentives. Presentation to the Harvard Electricity Policy Group, May 28-29, 2009, Cambridge, MA. 23 pages.

Hogan, William. Acting in Time on Energy Policy. Electricity Market Structure and Infrastructure. Aspen Institute, Energy Policy Forum. July 9, 2009, 17 pages.

Electricity markets support open access and non-discrimination to allow competition, entry, and innovation. Investment and operation in the competitive sectors follow the incentives induced by prices. To achieve the intended outcomes of reliability and economic efficiency, it is important to have efficient prices that are consistent with the objectives and operation of the underlying system. The basic design of successful organized electricity markets, built on the principles of bid-based, security-constrained economic dispatch, goes a long way towards meeting this objective. However, the real electricity system involves features that are difficult or impossible to fully reconcile within this core model. This calls for an application of the principles of dispatched-based pricing to move as far as possible to achieving the ideal of efficient pricing and minimizing the need for additional payments through uplift and other interventions to maintain reliability. The challenge is constantly present to match the prices to reflect the actual changing conditions of the dispatch. Motivated by issues under review in New England, a summary of the basic principles and illustrative applications provides examples of seeking the first-best efficient prices to mitigate the unintended consequences of second-best out-of-market payments.

Texas has a window of opportunity to complement its resource adequacy initiatives with an accelerated program to adopt an operating reserve demand curve. Suppressed prices in real-time markets provide inadequate incentives for both generation investment and active participation by demand bidding. An operating reserve demand curve developed from first principles would improve reliability, support adequate scarcity pricing, and be straightforward to implement within the framework of economic dispatch. This approach would be fully compatible with other market-oriented policies, the existing Texas “energy only” market design, and the proposed options for long-term resource adequacy.

Electricity prices that describe marginal costs can vary substantially over time. Fixed rates ignore changing electricity system conditions. Setting prices that differ for certain periods is an approach to approximating the real-time price. If such time-of-use prices are set in advance, they will necessarily miss the full variability of real real-time prices. A simple index indicates that even very good time-of-use rates would miss the majority of the efficiency gain that would result with use of actual real-time prices.

Hogan, William. Electricity Market Design and Efficient Pricing." Presentation to the Harvard Electricity Poicy Group 76th Plenary Session, Cambridge, MA, October 2014."

Hogan, William. Electricity Scarcity Pricing and Resource Adequacy." Presentation to the Harvard Electricity Policy Group, 74th Plenary Session, Santa Monica, CA, February 27, 2014."

Hogan, William. Scarcity Pricing: More On Locational Operating Reserve Demand Curve. Presentation to the Harvard Electricity Policy Group Fifty-Fourth Plenary Session. March 13, 2009. 47 pages.