Piclo, National Grid partner to ease access to local flex markets

London-based Piclo, a marketplace for energy flexibility services, and National Grid Electricity Distribution on Thursday unveiled a strategic partnership that seeks to improve access for flexibility service providers (FSP) to local distribution flexibility markets.

Starting from January 2024, more than 150 flex sellers, such as electric car and battery owners, with more than 60,000 assets registered on Piclo, will have direct access to National Grid’s Low Voltage Flexibility Opportunities, which aim to trade over 90 MW of local flexibility.

National Grid will build interfaces to its Market Gateway platform which will allow FSPs on Piclo to participate in National Grid’s distribution flexibility market territories.

The partnership is the first step in Piclo’s goal to enable flex sellers to access all six local flexibility markets from its new product Piclo Max. This would be followed by more UK electricity markets and further global markets.

Matt Watson, head of commercial and operability at National Grid, said the collaboration is an initial move in opening up National Grid’s Market Gateway platform for wider market entry.

“We hope to see an increase in the offers available to us and importantly we’ll be able to make fair decisions on market clearing regardless of which platform the FSP trades through,” Watson added.

“For the first time, FSPs have a choice regarding how they experience and interact with UK flex markets. It’s a significant milestone for market accessibility and a critical step towards enabling revenue stacking,” commented Piclo chief executive and co-founder James Johnston.

Piclo says it has over 60,000 registered flexible assets representing 19 GW of registered flex capacity.

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