State of European Power · January 2016

State of European Power — January 2016

Published 2016-02-02 · every figure recomputed live from the Voltcast production database (last: 2026-07-13T23:47Z) · reproduce any number via the API

6

negative price-hours across 33 zones in January 2016

36.56

average day-ahead price, €/MWh, across covered zones

2

zones that cleared below zero at least once

January 2016 closed with 6 negative price-hours across the 33 European bidding zones with full coverage this month — 2 of them cleared below zero at least once. Negative prices are no longer an anomaly; they are a structural feature of a grid where solar and wind routinely outrun demand.

The cheapest market of the month was DK1 (average 25.1 €/MWh); the priciest was LT (50.31 €/MWh) — a 25 €/MWh gap between two markets inside one coupled European system, which is the whole story of constrained interconnection in one number.

DK1 logged the most negative hours (5), and the widest intra-month price range belonged to DK2: from -0.27 to 214.25 €/MWh (214.52 €/MWh of spread — the raw material for every battery business case). The single deepest print of the month was -12.69 €/MWh in AT on 2016-01-04.

Every zone, one table

ZoneAvg €/MWhMinMaxNegative hours
AT 29.58 0.37 100.67 0
BE 32.6 6.25 127.65 0
CH 45.96 9.44 113.53 0
CZ 31.89 0.01 101.7 0
DK1 25.1 -2.97 92.75 5
DK2 30.84 -0.27 214.25 1
EE 37.63 4.69 200.06 0
ES 36.51 2.3 66.71 0
FI 37.83 4.69 214.25 0
FR 33.59 4.14 127.65 0
GR 48.74 0 91.79 0
HU 43.09 8 101.7 0
IT-CNOR 45.14 10 127.65 0
IT-CSUD 45.13 10 127.65 0
IT-NORD 47.84 10.35 127.65 0
IT-SARD 45.12 10 127.65 0
IT-SICI 47.33 10 94.77 0
IT-SUD 40.16 5 97.93 0
LT 50.31 15.36 200.06 0
LV 50.01 15.36 200.06 0
NL 31.56 9.85 123.62 0
NO1 30.28 12.53 214.25 0
NO2 25.82 12.53 95.06 0
NO3 28.25 12.69 214.25 0
NO4 27.84 12.69 214.25 0
NO5 25.87 12.53 95.06 0
PT 36.38 2.3 66 0
SE1 28.19 4.69 214.25 0
SE2 28.19 4.69 214.25 0
SE3 30.98 4.69 214.25 0
SE4 30.99 4.69 214.25 0
SI 43.16 1 100.67 0
SK 34.47 0.01 101.7 0

Method & citation. Hourly means over all published day-ahead auction results per zone (native 15-minute periods averaged per hour); zones with under 20 reported days excluded. Sources: ENTSO-E Transparency Platform, SMARD (CC BY 4.0). Reproduce via GET /api/v1/prices/{zone}. Cite as "Voltcast Research, voltcast.com/research/state-of-european-power-2016-01".