The head official of EVIKEN, Greece’s Association of Industrial Energy Consumers, has warned of dangers faced by the industrial sector as a result of higher wholesale electricity prices and serious balancing market issues.

Balancing market costs have spun out of control amid the pandemic, whilst the market, as currently structured, enables players to achieve windfall profits by differentiating their offers in the day-ahead and balancing markets, Antonis Kontoleon, the EVIKEN chief, pointed out in comments to energypress.

Players are overstating grid needs or understating RES output projections, or doing both, a tactic that further increases the need for far greater energy quantities and leads to higher energy prices, Kontoleon warned.