Artelys Improves Energy Supply and Cost For 300+ Million Europeans Using FICO Optimization

Artelys, an independent company specializing in optimization, modeling and decision-support based in France, has created the TERRE market platform used for the activation of electricity reserves by nine European Transmission System Operators (TSOs). The TERRE platform ensures the balancing of power systems and security of supply at an efficient cost for more than 300 million Europeans. At the heart of the system is FICO® Xpress Optimization.

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“TERRE is a critical system, whose importance will only grow with increased penetration of intermittent renewable energy sources and phase-out of traditional thermal production generation,” said Michaël Gabay, director at Artelys. “Indeed, with intermittent generation the inaccuracy of generation and net demand forecasts will only grow in coming years. The TERRE system will be able to adjust generation and demand faster, in larger volumes and closer to real time than has ever been done before. This project highlights how FICO Xpress Optimization technology can be used in critical systems, impacting millions of people.”

Managing the World’s Largest Synchronous Electrical Grid

The synchronous electrical grid of Continental Europe is the largest in the world. Each TSO is responsible for the security of the electricity grid to avoid any service disruption or blackouts.

When a deviation is identified, the TSOs must restore the system stability in real-time. These deviations may have several origins, such as forecast errors on demand or renewable generation, unplanned outages of generation or transmission line, or catastrophic events occurring in one area of the synchronized grid (such as war-impacted Ukraine, which was recently synchronized).

“Deviations, especially those due to forecast errors, happen all the time,” said Gabay. “It is simply impossible to perfectly predict demand or intermittent generation. It is of utmost importance to be able to adjust generation and flexible demands in real-time. This is the role of electricity reserves, which are activated and exchanged through balancing platforms. Cross-border exchanges of reserves allow for higher security of the power system as well as more cost-effective management and activations of reserves.”

The TERRE project created a platform for the activation and cross-border exchange of replacement reserves. Its market clearing engine, which is the heart of the solution, computes the activated bids and demands and relies on FICO® Xpress Optimization. Artelys has a strong partnership with FICO, and has leveraged the capability of FICO Xpress for more than 15 years.

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No Room for Failure

The challenge of this project was to develop a market-clearing algorithm that could select the optimal set of bids available on the platform to cover the replacement reserve needs of the TSOs, while abiding by numerous technical constraints and business rules. The computation engine must always return a solution in less than three minutes while handling a hard optimization problem with up to 500,000 bids and including coupled markets, coupled time steps, linked bids and non-divisible bids.

“This is a complex and large-scale optimization problem that requires solving multiple mixed-integer linear problems and mixed-integer quadratic problems,” said Gabay. “The platform is meant to ensure security of electricity supply, so it may not fail. The availability level must remain above 99.9 percent and expert support is available 24/7. To solve these challenges, we used FICO Xpress Optimization.”

The TERRE market platform replaces a fragmented process, mainly managed at the national level, which was composed of several local mostly non-optimized sub-systems. This new platform integrates the whole process at the European level, which will lead to improved robustness of the European electrical grid and substantial cost savings.

“As a FICO partner, Artelys’ expertise in mathematical optimization applied to the energy sector has enabled FICO to consolidate its position as one of the leading optimization solvers for energy applications in Europe,” said Nicolas Omont, vice president of operations at Artelys. “FICO Xpress has become a key component of the European energy transition.”

“Designing and implementing the auction clearing algorithm for the European balancing platform has been a very exciting and challenging project with some of the highest stakes for the European Power System,” said Michaël Gabay. “Being able to rely on FICO Xpress technology and its development team has been a key factor in the successful implementation of a lightning-fast and highly robust market clearing engine for this new market.”

“Solving large-scale, complex optimization problems of this nature is a strength of FICO Platform and it requires high accuracy, reliability and consistency — with something as critical as energy supply, there is no room for failure,” said Nikhil Behl, chief marketing officer at FICO. “We at FICO applaud Artelys for their ground-breaking achievement, which will help make energy supply more reliable and affordable across Europe.”

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