With the increasing amount of renewable intermittent production, interest in trading in the intraday markets is increasing, as it becomes ever more challenging for market participants to be in balance after the closing of the day-ahead market.

Being balanced on the network closer to delivery time is beneficial for market participants and for power systems alike by, among other reasons, reducing the need for reserves and associated costs. In addition, the intraday market is an essential tool that allows market participants to take unexpected changes in consumption and outages into account.

This is a continuous market, with trading taking place every day around the clock until one hour before delivery, and in some cases right up until the delivery hour. Prices are set based on a first-come, first-served principle, where best prices come first – highest buy price and lowest sell price.

Nord Pool provides a wide set of order types available for buyers and sellers to match the dynamics of the demand or supply they are offering.

The daily process

Capacities in the intraday system are provided by transmission system operators (TSOs) and are determined by the relevant TSOs after flow results of the day-ahead auction. Exact timing of capacity allocation varies and depends both on operational procedures and individual agreements between TSOs on the different borders. Intraday capacities are updated automatically, depending on the volume and direction of intraday trades. 

Our intraday markets are open 24/7, 365 days a year offering 15-minute, 30-minute, hourly and block products providing the flexibility to meet the needs of different market areas.

Public Description of the Continuous Trading Matching Algorithm can be found here.