State of European Power · January 2019

State of European Power — January 2019

Published 2019-02-02 · every figure recomputed live from the Voltcast production database (last: 2026-07-13T23:50Z) · reproduce any number via the API

113

negative price-hours across 37 zones in January 2019

60.84

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

9

zones that cleared below zero at least once

January 2019 closed with 113 negative price-hours across the 37 European bidding zones with full coverage this month — 9 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 DE-LU (average 49.84 €/MWh); the priciest was IE-SEM (79.05 €/MWh) — a 29 €/MWh gap between two markets inside one coupled European system, which is the whole story of constrained interconnection in one number.

DE-LU logged the most negative hours (29), and the widest intra-month price range belonged to IE-SEM: from -0.15 to 365.04 €/MWh (365.19 €/MWh of spread — the raw material for every battery business case). The single deepest print of the month was -108.08 €/MWh in AT on 2019-01-01.

Every zone, one table

ZoneAvg €/MWhMinMaxNegative hours
AT 56.55 -3.77 116.47 4
BE 60.48 19.27 121.46 0
CH 62.34 26.81 108.11 0
CZ 55.38 -7.85 109.3 5
DE-LU 49.84 -32.8 114.96 29
DK1 50.33 -48.29 109.45 29
DK2 51.69 -48.29 109.45 29
EE 55.79 4.04 109.45 0
ES 61.96 19.74 74.74 0
FI 55.81 4.04 109.45 0
FR 61.15 18.98 121.46 0
GR 75.25 0 145 0
HR 69.32 -8.99 151.05 4
HU 73.23 7.92 138.82 0
IE-SEM 79.05 -0.15 365.04 4
IT-CNOR 67.54 20 113.07 0
IT-CSUD 65.56 20 113.07 0
IT-NORD 67.62 20 113.07 0
IT-SARD 65.43 20 113.07 0
IT-SICI 78.4 20 148.93 0
IT-SUD 63.76 20 93.15 0
LT 56.53 1.17 109.45 0
LV 56.65 4.04 109.45 0
NL 58.3 19.9 121.46 0
NO1 55.81 46.28 109.45 0
NO2 55.57 46.28 109.45 0
NO3 52.45 43.81 68.8 0
NO4 51.22 43.81 68 0
NO5 55.53 46.28 109.45 0
PT 62.66 41.1 74.74 0
RS 75.97 25.46 132.97 0
SE1 53.53 4.04 107.67 0
SE2 53.53 4.04 107.67 0
SE3 54.4 4.04 109.45 0
SE4 54.94 4.04 109.45 0
SI 68.77 -8.99 151.05 4
SK 58.83 -7.85 120.1 5

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-2019-01".