Slovenia introduces a new electricity sharing system for prosumers

In July, Slovenia will introduce a new electricity sharing system that allows users to share renewable electricity with each other. Consumers with solar panels will be able to transfer surplus electricity that they do not use and would otherwise feed into the grid. Participants do not need to be neighbours, or even live in the same town or region.

A producer can share electricity with anyone within Slovenia. Anyone can take part as a recipient, except large companies and entities where electricity sharing would count as a commercial activity. Users in the annual net-metering self-supply system will only be able to join as electricity providers, not as recipients.

How electricity sharing will work

In practice, the system will operate in 15-minute settlement intervals. A provider can agree on sharing arrangements with one or more recipients and set the share of electricity for each 15-minute period. These shares can be changed monthly through the Moj Elektro portal, where both providers and recipients can register.

The electricity will not physically travel through the grid to the recipient. Instead, it will be recorded as an administrative transfer of electricity fed into the grid. This means the shared electricity will only appear on the recipient’s electricity bill issued by their supplier. In this way, the recipient can reduce their electricity costs during the 15-minute periods when the solar power plant of the provider produces surplus electricity.

If the recipient does not use all the shared electricity in a given 15-minute period, the unused amount goes to the recipient’s electricity supplier. Electricity sharing is only reflected in the energy supply part of the bill and does not affect network charges, except for users in the annual net-metering system.

Price

Providers can sell electricity to one or more recipients at a pre-agreed price, based on a formal legal agreement. The price depends entirely on the agreement between the provider and the recipient. Providers may also share electricity with family or friends at a symbolic price.

For example, a producer uses 7,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity from the grid during a billing period, while feeding 9,000 kWh. If they share 1,000 kWh through the sharing system, they would still have 1,000 kilowatt-hours left, which will be counted as surplus in the bill for that period.