The main reasons for the existence of a regional market are the savings in operating costs as the result of various load profiles, the use of common reserve capacities, then, the support in case of emergency situations and the reduction in investments and costs of energy purchase.
The conditions that have to be fulfilled so that a regional market could exist are – available production capacities, the transmission capacities between the countries participating in the market and the transmission capacities of interconnection lines, which is a limiting factor for the successful development of a regional market.
In 2013, the total available electricity on the transmission grid in Bosnia and Herzegovina amounted to 18.937 GWh. 15.712 GWh were produced on the transmission grid, whereas 58GWh were injected into the transmission grid from the distribution grid.
Of the total available electricity on the transmission grid, distribution companies took over 9.215 GWh, the buyers directly connected to the transmission grid took over 2.517 GWh, 6.862 GWh were delivered to the neighbouring systems, whereas the transmission losses amounted to 343 GWh, which represented 1.81% of the total available energy on the transmission grid.
In 2013, the electricity consumption in BiH was by 1% lower than the consumption in 2012, the surplus product of 28.4% with respect to 2012 was sold outside the borders of BiH. Of the total 15.712 GWh of electricity produced on the transmission grid in 2013, 44.4% of electricity was produced in hydropower plants, and the remaining 55.6% of electricity in thermal power plants.
At the level of the European Union, ten parameters have been defined which will mostly affect the development of the national and the European electric power system and electricity market by 2050: the level of gross domestic product (GDP) and the EU population size, the level of electricity consumption, the level of application of energy efficiency measures depending on the level of development and implementation of the European regulations directed towards the reduction in electricity consumption, the level of implementation of facilities for centralized electricity storage, the level of use of centralized renewable resources power plants, the level of use of decentralized production units using renewable resources, the level of using nuclear power plants, the level of using thermal power plants, the level of electricity exchange with the countries that are not EU members and the level of electricity exchange between the EU member states.
In the long run, so as to establish a regional electricity market, countries must agree to define, analyze and develop the grid rules, the trade rules, the settlement procedures, as well as to establish/develop an energy pool or an electricity exchange.
