As a business with solar panels or in-house power generation, you’ve probably noticed: sometimes you pay to deliver electricity to the grid, rather than get money for it. This phenomenon is called negative injection pricing and can have a significant impact on your energy costs.
What are negative injection prices?
Normally, the energy supplier pays a fee for the excess electricity that you as a company inject into the grid (= positive injection rate). When the available electricity on the grid exceeds the demand, negative injection prices occur. So as a solar panel owner, you pay for the excess electricity that is fed back to the grid (= negative injection tariff).
How do negative injection prices arise?
Injection prices can turn negative when renewable energy production, such as solar and wind power, is very high while electricity demand is low. This imbalance between supply and demand occurs mainly on weekends and vacations, when industrial and commercial activities are reduced.
With a negative injection rate, the energy supplier wants to deter you as a solar energy generator to avoid overloading the power grid.
Some causes of oversupply:
- In sunny weather with lots of PV production.
- During periods of low demand (night hours, weekends, holidays).
- When grid capacity is limited.
Why is this so important for businesses?
As a company with solar panels, this can incur unforeseen costs during times of oversupply:
- Financial impact: Instead of generating revenue, injecting energy can cost money.
- PV optimization is crucial: Unnecessary injection can extend the payback period of your solar panels.
- Invisible costs: Without monitoring, you may not see which hours are negative and where your energy, and therefore money, is being wasted.
How can you control the impact of this?
By understanding your energy consumption. And that’s exactly what we do with PowerBee: smart monitoring and energy management so you can minimize negative injection prices with your SME:
- Real-time monitoring of energy production and injection prices to examine your SME’s energy patterns in detail, including how much power you are producing, consuming and unintentionally injecting into the grid. Understanding market prices allows you to make better decisions.
- Automatic steering of consumption to times of high prices or negative injection. We show exactly when and how much you inject at negative prices.
- Integration with BESS ( battery storage) to store excess energy for later use. Batteries can store surplus instead of sending it into the grid.
- Smart link with EMS (Energy Management System) for optimization of all business processes. This ensures that your energy management automatically responds to price fluctuations.
Conclusion
For businesses with in-house energy production, negative injection prices are a hidden cost. With smart monitoring and PowerBee’s energy solutions, you can prevent energy losses, maximize the yield of your solar panels and reduce energy costs.
We are happy to make your acquaintance. 🙂 In our no-obligation analysis easily share your company’s energy data and get quick insight into if, when and how much you’re losing to negative pricing. No strings attached.