On December 11, Red Eléctrica de España and Réseau de Transport d?Éléctricité (RTE), operators of the electricity systems of Spain and France respectively, held the annual capacity auctions for the Spain ? France interconnection for 2010. In these auctions, the accredited agents obtain the right to use interconnection capacity for each hour of the year, except for those periods of reduced capacity due to scheduled non-availabilities in the transmission grid.

In the Spain ? France direction, 100 MW were offered and allocated, whereas in the reverse direction 300 MW were allocated. The resulting price of these auctions was 9.17 ?/MW in the first case, and 2.69 ?/MW in the second. In the Spain to France auction, six of the 16 participant agents obtained interconnection capacity whilst in the France to Spain auction, six of the 13 participants.

These annual capacity auctions, performed in agreement with the European regulation for cross-border trade, have generated revenues of 13.68 million euros. Half of this, corresponding to Spain, is destined to the reduction of the regulated costs of the Spanish electricity system.