BC2

Sets out the procedure for the operation of the Balancing Mechanism units, acceptance of bids/offers, calling of ancillary services, issuing and implementing or emergency instructions and the issuing other notifications after gate closure.

Participants in the BM must ensure that BMUs follow FPNs after gate closure subject to:

• Bid-offer acceptances (BOAs)
• NG insructions which result in output/input variation
• or an unavoidable event e.g. trip or safety issue.

Deviations from FPN must be communicated to NG via re-submission of MEL.

Any delay of geater than 5 minutes on syncing or advancement of great than 5 minutes on desyncing must be communicated to NG as soon as possible by resubmission of a new MEL.

A BMU may not sync/desync without a FPN submitted or BOA unless:

• an ancillary agreement is in place such as an inter-trip scheme (Heysham)
• Plant breakdown or safety.

Post gate closure, no revisions are allowed to the PN or bid/offer data however dynamic data can be submitted in real time. 

A BOA or ancillary services may only be rejected on safety grounds or because of inconsistencies with dynamic data. Any rejection must be backed up with a call to NG to expain why.

Any bid-offer instruction issued by NG must be confirmed or rejected within two minutes. If the instruction has not been accepted by the CCR, it would be prudent to ring the CCR to find our the reason, they might just not have seen it.

Accepting then failing to deliver a BOA results in the BMU paying a fee to NG, which will be the larger or either the bid/offer price or the cashout price. The logic is to prevent a situation where a BMU can profit from accepting but then not delivering.