Indian Energy Exchange trade volume falls 7% to 8,200 mn units in February

The total trade volume at the Indian Energy Exchange (IEX) declined seven per cent to 8,200 million units in February on an annual basis, due to lower availability of electricity.

Sell side liquidity continued to be affected due to high input costs, the IEX said in a statement.

According to the bourse, supply constraints are expected to ease in the coming months due to the conducive policy and regulatory initiatives that will lead to an increase in coal and gas-based generation. This will also provide cost optimisation opportunities to discoms and open access consumers.

The overall trade volume on the IEX in February was 8,200 Million Units (MU), a de-growth of 7 per cent on a year-on-year basis.

The 8,200 MU included 7,673 MU of conventional power, green power trade of 341 MU, 3.74 lakh of Renewable Energy Certificates (equivalent to 374 MU) and 1.54 ESCerts (equivalent to 154 MU).

ESCerts are Energy Saving Certificates.

In February 2022, the trade volume stood at 8,760 MU, comprising 7,695 MU in the conventional power market, 453 MU in the green power market and 6.12 lakh Renewable Energy Certificates (equivalent to 612 MU)

According to the IEX, the demand for power increased due to unusually warm temperature witnessed in February across several parts of the country, and sustained momentum in economic activities.

While the average daily volume traded on the IEX increased five per cent on a month-on-month basis in February, the overall volume declined 5 per cent the month-on-month basis due to lesser trading days vis--vis the previous month.

The electricity volume on the IEX in February 2023 at 7,673 MU, registered 6 per cent decline on the year-on-year basis and 7 per cent on the month-on-month basis.

IEX resumed trading of ESCerts on February 14 after a gap of 14 months.

The Day-Ahead Market volume decreased to 4,664 MU in February from 4,893 MU in January.

On the year-on-year basis, the Day Ahead Market volume was lower by 17 per cent due to high prices resulting from a constrained supply scenario, which led to continued high spot e-auction coal prices.

The Real-Time Electricity Market (RTM) achieved 1,714 MU volume in February, an annual growth of 10 per cent.

The Term-Ahead Market (TAM), comprising intra-day, contingency, daily & weekly contracts, and contracts up to 3 months, saw trading of 954 MU in February.

This is an increase of 81 per cent compared to the year-ago period.

IEX Green Market, comprising the Green Day-Ahead and Green Term-Ahead Market segments, achieved 341 MU volume during February.

A total of 3.74 lakh RECs were cleared in the trading session at IEX held on February 22. The clearing price was Rs 1,000/REC.