The European Union's Flexibility Needs Assessment Methodology

Significant challenges lie ahead to make the electricity system more flexible to integrate variable renewables and achieve a cost-efficient path to meet the European Union’s decarbonisation objectives. The deployment of energy storage technologies will grow significantly and play an indispensable role in this transformation. A deeper understanding of evolving flexibility needs and the role of storage in addressing them is essential.

The Electricity Market Design Reform (EMDR) tasked the DSO Entity and ENTSO-E with developing a methodology to analyse flexibility needs. A draft proposal of this methodology is currently under consultation before its submission to ACER for possible amendments and approval. Once finalised, TSOs and DSOs will apply the methodology to analyse flexibility needs, producing results that will inform national reports prepared by National Regulatory Authorities or other designated entities. Based on these reports, Member States will set indicative targets for non-fossil flexibility, including specific sub-targets for energy storage. Developing a robust methodology is crucial to ensure policymakers receive accurate and actionable insights.

EASE’s response provides detailed comments on specific Articles of the draft methodology, while broader remarks are addressed in the last question addressing general feedback.