Case Study: Vattenfall achieves 5–15% higher balancing-energy auction success with SAS Analytics

Developing a bid strategy for "balancing energy" auctions

Vattenfall, a major European energy company, needed to optimize how it participates in balancing energy auctions—competitive, tightly regulated bids that secure reserve power to keep the grid stable. Because balancing bids carry legal obligations to deliver and depend on volatile inputs (fuel and CO2 prices, plant availability, auction dynamics), Vattenfall required a disciplined, data-driven bidding strategy that balances revenue opportunity with operational risk and regulatory traceability.

Working with SAS, Vattenfall implemented a forecasting, simulation and stochastic optimization solution that generated thousands of auction scenarios and translated them into a holistic offer strategy for each plant. The system improved decision transparency for audits, let planners set acceptable risk corridors before each auction, and boosted balancing-auction success by 5–15% (with a prototype indicating potential millions in additional revenue), while reducing auction-related risk.

Vattenfall

Ralf Kirsch

Head of Resource Planning/Analytics