Press Release

This announcement means that Flexibility Service Providers can view all UK local flex markets from a single platform for the first time.

London, 15 February 2024 – Piclo, the premier marketplace for flexibility services, is now ensuring information from all flexibility markets in the UK is visible on one platform for Flexibility Service Providers (FSPs). The information can be accessed through its new Piclo Max platform designed for FSPs. 

A recent trial has allowed Piclo to display information from SSEN’s January bidding round. Piclo will be looking to further enhance this opportunity by developing interfaces with either SSEN’s current service, or its forthcoming new procurement platform. This development will enable hundreds of active FSPs, with over 60,000 assets and 19GW of registered capacity on the Piclo platform, to seamlessly access and participate in SSEN’s tenders. It will also offers SSEN a wider pool of experienced FSPs to tap into.

In its autumn/winter 2023/24 tender, SSEN looked to procure 8.2MW of capacity across eight regions, and the publication of this information in the Piclo platform illustrated this to several additional providers who are looking to sign overarching agreements to participate in future tenders. FSPs can register on the Piclo platform to be notified when future tenders are listed.  

In November 2023, Piclo announced its new platform, Piclo Max, a world-first solution to enable flex sellers to access all electricity markets from one place. Phase 1 looked at enabling access to all UK local flex markets by early 2024 and working  with SSEN is the final piece of the jigsaw for this first phase. Piclo is delighted to offer UK flex sellers access to all the UK local flexibility markets, with further UK electricity markets being onboarded throughout 2024, followed by markets in Europe and North America.

With the UK electricity system using more distributed energy resources, due to the rapid growth of renewables and the rise of the so-called energy ‘prosumer’ (a consumer who also produces, stores, and sells energy back to the grid), a fully flexible energy system is of vital importance to achieving net zero and reducing costs.  A study by Imperial College London and the Carbon Trust found that if the UK embedded a fully flexible energy system, there is the potential to deliver material net savings of between £9.6 billion and £16.7 billion per year by 2050.

Catherine Winning, Flexibility Markets Manager at Scottish and Southern Electricity Distribution Networks says:

“We are constantly looking for ways to make accessing flexibility markets as easy as possible. Our open-source data will allow a range of platforms to take this step of integrating flexibility services. We look forward to working with Piclo and other providers as they develop these further.”

James Johnston, Piclo CEO and Co-founder, says:

‍“Working with SSEN takes us one step closer to delivering true market interoperability and revenue stacking. It empowers Flexibility Service Providers (FSPs) by giving them the ability to choose how they engage and interact with all the local flexibility markets in the UK. This is a critical milestone in enhancing market access and a vital step towards enabling asset revenue stacking.”‍

About Scottish and Southern Energy Networks:

Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) Distribution is the electricity distribution arm of the FTSE-50 energy company, SSE. We serve over 3.9 million customers across the diverse and unique geographies of the north of Scotland, and central southern England.