Balance Responsible Party (BRP)
A Balance Responsible Party is a market participant that has signed a balance agreement with the Transmission System Operator and accepts financial responsibility for any imbalance between its scheduled and actual electricity consumption or production in each trading period. In Estonia, every retail supplier and every directly-trading large customer must be a BRP or be represented by one.
A Balance Responsible Party (BRP) is the financial counterparty to every wholesale electricity transaction in a control area. The role is defined in the Electricity Balancing Guideline (Commission Regulation (EU) 2017/2195, Article 18) and implemented in Estonian law via Elektrituruseadus § 11 (defining the BRP), § 43 (defining balance responsibility) and § 44 (open supply). Every kilowatt-hour that physically flows on the Estonian grid rolls up to one of the registered BRPs.
How balance responsibility works
Every market participant that produces, consumes, or trades electricity must either become a BRP itself or contract with one. Before gate closure on the day-ahead market, the BRP submits its final position — a schedule of how much it expects to deliver into and draw from the grid in each trading period — to the TSO. After delivery, the TSO measures actual flows, compares them to the schedule, and bills the BRP for any deviation at the imbalance price.
Settlement mechanics in Estonia
Estonia is transitioning the imbalance settlement period from one full hour to fifteen minutes under EBGL Article 53, in line with EU-wide convergence. The imbalance price is calculated separately for up- and down-regulation directions and reflects the activated balancing energy from BSPs in that period. In effect, a BRP pays roughly what it cost the TSO to fix its mistake.
Distinction from BSP
A BRP carries financial responsibility for keeping its portfolio balanced. A BSP delivers physical balancing services — frequency reserves — to the TSO. The same legal entity often holds both certifications, but the roles are separate: a BRP can exist without delivering reserves, and a BSP can sell reserves without taking imbalance risk on a portfolio.
Bilansileping — the balance agreement
The contractual instrument that establishes BRP status is the bilansileping (balance agreement) signed with Elering. Without it, no commercial activity is possible on the wholesale market. Volton holds a balance agreement with Elering and acts as a BRP for its retail customers and aggregated flexibility portfolio.