Market Entry and Regulatory Navigation
Guiding you through each step of acceding to the Balancing and Settlement Code (BSC) Framework Agreement, our support includes:
Party ID and Energy Accounts Setup: From securing your Party ID to successful allocation of your Energy Accounts
Metering System Registration: Complete guidance on CVA (Central Volume Allocation) or SVA (Supplier Volume Allocation) settlement routes and their implications for your business model
Regulatory Navigation: Translation of dense regulatory documentation into clear, actionable roadmaps
Compliance Clarity: Detailed explanation of which BSC Sections apply to your business (e.g., BSCP20 for CVA, BSCP501 for SVA)
Our expertise ensures you understand the prerequisites, avoid common pitfalls, and complete your registration efficiently under BSCP65 requirements.
Balancing Mechanism Unit (BMU) Registration
Establishing your presence in the Balancing Mechanism (BM) requires careful coordination across multiple stakeholders. We support you through the interdependencies between NESO and Elexon registration processes, ensuring critical milestones are correctly sequenced while maximising opportunities for parallel processing to accelerate your market entry. Our support includes every aspect of BMU registration:
- Completing the parallel submissions to NESO and Elexon to secure your BMU ID
- Helping you establish communications readiness, including Electronic Data Transfer (EDT), Electronic Dispatch Logging (EDL), or Wider Access API (WA API)
- Coordinating the Energy Identification Code (EIC) applications
- Strategically aligning all submissions with the bi-monthly Scheduling, Operations, Registrations and Transactions (SORT) data upload cycles so that your BMU appears in NESO systems before energisation
Given the ongoing Open Balancing Platform (OBP) transition, we help you navigate both current requirements and prepare for upcoming platform changes. Our integrated approach prevents costly delays from missed windows, overlooked dependencies or preventable registration errors, ensuring your BMU achieves market-active status within your commercial timelines.
Capacity Market (CM) and Contracts for Difference (CfD) Support
We support clients through the complex journey of securing CM agreements and CfD contracts.
Capacity Market Services
For the Capacity Market, our review ensures that your pre-qualification application meets EMR Delivery Body requirements before submission. We offer:
- Detailed entry-by-entry scrutiny of your application to catch common rejection triggers
- Exhibit pack compilation aligned with CM Rules and your business requirements
- For BESS applicants, tailored support on optimal configuration, evaluating trade-offs between storage duration, de-rating factors, and Extended Performance Test (EPT) deliverability risks
Following successful awards, we support you through different milestones such as the Financial Commitment Milestone (FCM), Substantial Completion Milestone (SCM), metering tests and EMRS registration for settlement. We also assist with ongoing performance obligations including Satisfactory Performance Days calculations, stress event response strategies, and preparation for delivery year testing requirements. Our proactive approach helps you avoid performance penalties while maximizing the value of your capacity agreements.
CfD Services
For CfD market, we support our clients by:
- Conducting allocation round readiness assessments, including application review and preparation support against Allocation Round rules and guidance from NESO and Low Carbon Contracts Company (LCCC)
- Verifying that the details are internally consistent, and the evidence set aligns with what the Delivery Body will assess
- Advising on appropriateness of Minor & Necessary (M&N) modification where a small drafting/clerical issue could prevent submission,
- Performing quick completeness checks on mandatory statements such as Supply Chain Plan Statements and Clean Industry Bonus Statements where applicable
Post-award, we translate the LCCC’s milestones into an executable plan by helping prepare the Initial Conditions Precedent (ICP) pack, Milestone Delivery Date (MDD) roadmap, and Operational Condition Precedents (OCPs) evidence. We keep a watch on the Target Commissioning Window (TCW) so that termination risks are mitigated.
Revenue stacking advisory & ancillary services onboarding
The GB market playbook has shifted: rather than leaning on a single revenue stream, market players now succeed by stacking different revenue routes such as wholesale, BM, CM, and NESO/DSO flexibility services, and ancillary services. This shift reflects fundamental market changes. As BESS capacity has scaled in recent years, traditional ancillary services incomes have compressed. And while access to BM is improving (with BESS ‘skip rates’ declining), the revenue mix has tilted toward wholesale market. Thus, returns increasingly depend on stacking multiple revenue streams that work together technically and contractually. However, NESO’s evolving service definitions and complex interaction rules make this increasingly challenging. Moreover, some services allow co-delivery (same MW/same period/same direction), others permit splitting (different MW/same period) or jumping (different periods), while certain combinations forbid any overlap entirely.
Our Revenue Stacking advisory support includes:
- Suitability Scan: Establishing what your asset can credibly deliver
- Onboarding Pathway: Translation of service rulebooks and technical specifications into a clear onboarding pathway, tailored to your asset’s technical capabilities and commercial constraints
- Compatibility Analysis: Identifying which combinations of wholesale, BM, CM, and ancillary services (e.g., DC/DR/DM) your asset can stack effectively, ensuring revenue routes complement rather than conflict with each other operationally or contractually
- Shortest-Path Planning: Mapping registration evidence, metering/telemetry, comms routes, and testing steps you will face into a shortest-path plan to qualification and dispatch with your optimiser
Flexibility Services Advisory
GB’s local flexibility procurement has scaled rapidly, with DSOs contracting around 9GW volume in 2024–25. DSOs now regularly publish their flexibility requirements and actively procure flexibility through competitive long-term tenders and week/day-ahead procurement (where offered). Procurement platforms differ by DSO: SPEN and Northern Powergrid use Piclo Flex, SSEN and ENWL procure via Electron Connect, UKPN uses Localflex, while NGED uses Market Gateway (accessible through Piclo). However, the DSOs are converging on common product definitions and baselining/settlement methodologies under Elexon’s new Market Facilitator role.
We take you from “being interested” to “contracted” in DSO flexibility markets. Our service includes:
- Opportunity Assessment: Mapping your assets to the correct Constraint Management Zone (CMZ) and matching capabilities to DSO products (Peak reduction, Scheduled Utilisation, Operational Utilisation, etc.)
- Pre-Qualification Preparation: Providing step-by-step guidance on asset validation, market platform onboarding, and DSO framework agreements
- Bidding & Settlement: Delivering in-depth understanding of bidding rules and payment structures to ensure your bids are compliant and operationally realistic
Moreover, where clients want to parallelly access transmission-level flexibility routes, we develop a revenue stacking plan that includes NESO’s Demand Flexibility Service (DFS) and Local Constraint Market (LCM) where permitted.
Your Partner in Market Success
BSC accession is your gateway to GB markets. A Party can apply to be registered immediately after an application for accession is lodged. However, registration is not made effective until the Party Applicant has acceded and set up Authorised Persons in accordance with BSCP38. BMU registration involves careful sequencing between NESO and Elexon with narrow process windows. Missing a single SORT cycle means an 8+ weeks delay in market participation. CM pre-qualification rejection rates are significant and costly. The 2024/25 auctions saw approximately a 22% rejection rate for T-4 applications and around a 17% rejection rate for T-1 applications. Overall, about 1 in every 5 CM applications failed to prequalify, meaning months of development effort and a year’s wait until the next auction opportunity. Revenue stacking sounds simple – just participate in everything. However, co-delivering BM and certain ancillary services may violate service rules, whereas CM performance obligations can constrain BM participation. Additionally, understanding which DSO flexibility products you qualify for, navigating different platform requirements (Piclo vs Electron vs Localflex vs Market Gateway), and ensuring your bids are compliant is non-trivial.
At Blake Clough, we excel in translating complex market obligations (BSC, Grid Code, CM Rules) into clear implementation plans containing practical engineering decisions. Rules change regularly, creating new requirements and opportunities that can have a major impact on your project economics. Our expertise assists you to participate in the different market segments, avoiding costly compliance failures, and capturing the full value of your investment.