Roles of Retailers in the Peer-to-Peer Electricity Market: A Single Retailer Perspective

TL;DR

This paper explores the potential role of retailers in peer-to-peer electricity markets, proposing a model for their participation that could benefit all stakeholders and address regulatory concerns.

Contribution

It introduces a novel perspective on integrating retailers into peer-to-peer markets, which has not been previously studied, and proposes a hypothetical business model.

Findings

Retailers can participate in peer-to-peer markets without disrupting market dynamics.

A hypothetical business model demonstrates potential collective benefits for participants.

The study provides a foundation for future research on retailer involvement in decentralized energy trading.

Abstract

Despite extensive research in the past five years and several successfully completed and on-going pilot projects, regulators are still reluctant to implement peer-to-peer trading at a large-scale in today's electricity market. The reason could partly be attributed to the perceived disadvantage of current market participants like retailers due to their exclusion from market participation - a fundamental property of decentralised peer-to-peer trading. As a consequence, recently, there has been growing pressure from energy service providers in favour of retailers' participation in peer-to-peer trading. However, the role of retailers in the peer-to-peer market is yet to be established as no existing study has challenged this fundamental circumspection of decentralized trading. In this context, this perspective takes the first step to discuss the feasibility of retailers' involvement in the peer-to-peer market. In doing so, we identify key characteristics of retail-based and peer-to-peer electricity markets and discuss our viewpoint on how to incorporate a single retailer in a peer-to-peer market without compromising the fundamental decision-making characteristics of both markets. Finally, we give an example of a hypothetical business model to demonstrate how a retailer can be a part of a peer-to-peer market with a promise of collective benefits for the participants.