CASE SUDY: European Replacement Reserves Platform (LIBRA Platform)

Unicorn Systems a.s. (Unicorn) in collaboration with Artelys SAS successfully delivered the European Replacement Reserves Platform (LIBRA Platform) which enables harmonised exchange and optimised activation of Replacement Reserves. The platform is live since January, 2020 and is being used by several European Transmission System Operators (TSOs) - ČEPS (CZE), RTE (FRA), REE (ESP), REN (PRT), Terna (ITA), Swissgrid (CHE).

Project specifics

Based upon the results of the tender, Unicorn Systems a.s. was selected as the suppliers of the Data Management Module and provision of hosting services. Delivery required close cooperation among 5 participating IT providers.

Architecture diagram of LIBRA Data Management by Unicorn Systems and its connection to LIBRA Clearing by Artelys, created in uuMBL Draw

In 2014, European Transmission System Operators (TSOs) from six different countries founded new international project called TERRE with a goal to build up European exchange platform LIBRA.

For LIBRA, Unicorn provides also extensive support services. These include the second-line support and operation services provided systematically in a continuous and highly flexible 24/7/365 mode, in accordance with standard methodologies and approaches (such as best practices of ITIL). In addition to that, Unicorn provides hosting services (based on MS Azure) with high availability (99.9 %) and 24/7 support services.

User interface screenshot of the LIBRA platform showing the TERRE process dashboard with an interactive European energy map

Continuity of solutions

In 2016, a public tender has been opened for 6 different areas:

1. LIBRA Optimization Module

2. LIBRA Data Management

3. Hosting package

4. IT monitoring

5. Settlement service

6. Testing package

In 2018, Unicorn started the project and 10 months later, the first release hosted on cloud-based infrastructure has been successfully presented. Remaining parts were delivered and successfully tested within 2019. The system was successfully launched on 6 January 2020. Since that time, Unicorn is continuously improving LIBRA and is supporting original and new TSOs to join.

Functionality of the solution

Configuration of market structures, rules, users and roles

Regular hourly cross-border trading process completed in less than 15 minutes

15-minute data resolution

Real-time market monitoring

Graphical dashboards displaying data in tables, charts and on map

Settlement module for financial calculations and reporting to the settlement Service

Integration with national balancing systems of TSOs and with HVDC operators

Reporting towards ENTSO-E Transparency Platform, Pan-European Verification Platform

Various data reports

Fast and reliable

The LIBRA platform ensures cost-effective procurement of balancing energy with service availability of 30 minutes (i.e. Replacement Reserves) on the European scale. It collects offers, needs, capacity limits and constraints during the tendering phase and provides the collected data to the optimization module. It is possible to run three different optimization modes in parallel during the clearing phase.

The optimisation engine provided by Artelys SAS simultaneously clears upward and downward balancing offers from providers with balancing needs from TSOs.

Technically speaking, the market clearing engine optimises social welfare while taking into account other criteria (such as cross-border capacities) and handles volume/price discrepancies. It also generates key performance indicators for market monitoring purposes.

Based on the optimization outcome, LIBRA determines the final results that are distributed to the data consumers. It is possible to generate reports and extract data from LIBRA via an API. At the end of the clearing process, IT platform calculates TSO-LIBRA settlement.

Solution technology

LIBRA Platform is built using Unicorn Application Framework that allows to fulfil demanding non-functional requirements, for example:

99.9 % availability of the platform
Capability to process up to 500 000 incoming bids within 15 minutes
Distribution of results within 4 minutes
Zero downtime deployment
Microservice architecture
Cloud-based infrastructure

Responsive user interface design of the LIBRA platform displayed on a laptop screen and mobile phone mockup

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Contact for more info
Unicorn Systems a.s.
+420 221 400 111
info@unicorn.com

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