Can the ‘30-minute rule’ fuel battery energy storage revenues?

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The ESO introduced the 30-minute rule for batteries in the balancing mechanism in March 2024. This is an update to the 15-minute rule and effectively means that batteries can be used for longer than before. Following this change, the average dispatch volume from batteries increased from 1.1 GWh per day in the 8 weeks before the change to 1.4 GWh in the 8 weeks after.
But, how far can this increase be linked to the 30-minute rule? This graph shows the proportion of battery instructions based on duration in the eight weeks before the introduction of the 30-minute rule and the 8 weeks after.
Since the introduction of the 30-minute rule, the proportion of actions lasting more than 15-minutes increased from 5% to 14%.
Dispatches lasting 30-minutes or more increased from 0.7% to 3.7%.
While these longer dispatches still represent a small proportion of battery actions, each of these dispatch more energy volume, and this is what's important for batteries.
Benchmarking Pro GB subscribers can access the full article on the Modo platform to find out about the energy impact of the increase in 30-minute dispatches, how constraint management has impacted the dispatch volume of batteries, and how this differs by region.