The value of volatile resources in electricity markets

Closed-form expressions are obtained for the supplier and consumer surpluses based on computations for an associated two-dimensional diffusion process. These formulae quantify how the value of wind generation falls with volatility, and also how this cost can be reduced with the introduction of responsive ancillary services. Perhaps surprisingly, it is found in numerical experiments that the introduction of generation from wind may result in significant gains for the supplier of traditional generation respect to the case without volatile resources, even when the consumer owns and controls the wind farm.