Unbalanced Funds in Different Electric Power Trading Settlements

The prominently accumulating unbalanced funds emerging in many pilot provinces have become the main barriers of the spot market reform and development in China. This paper aims to clarify the sources of unbalanced funds and try to reduce them. First, the various settlement rules adopted by typical pilots are compared in the double-track system where spot markets coexist with the non-market electricity plan. Then, the mathematic expression of unbalanced funds is derived under different market rules and the corresponding influencing factors are analyzed. Finally, the case studies under different scenarios have shown that the settlement deviation between the forecasted non-market load and its actual power consumption contributes the main unbalanced funds in most periods with sufficient power supply. The results help improving the settlement rules and promote the power market reform in China.