Wholesale Power

Market Analysis, Modeling, & Forecasting

Gabel Associates provides customized and rigorous analysis to give clients a clear understanding of the economic and financial implications surrounding their energy decisions. Our advanced analytics are grounded in our deep commercial experience with hundreds of energy projects and transactions.

Gabel Associates has provided extensive market analysis and modeling for a wide range of clients in wholesale and retail energy markets. The firm monitors wholesale electric and natural gas markets and regional transmission organization (RTO) and state activities on a daily basis, and maintains extensive databases and in-house analytical tools that allow for advanced analysis and modeling of wholesale and retail power markets. The firm brings clarity to a fluctuating marketplace and enables our clients to make educated business decisions.

A differentiating factor of the firm is our advanced analysis, which incorporates our team’s multi-faceted and cross-cutting expertise. Our forecasting and analysis are informed by our ongoing engagement in project development and energy transactions in wholesale and retail markets.

Our work includes “bottom-up” cost analysis to determine the fundamentals of power supply costs and provides our clients with well-formulated forecasts of wholesale and retail electricity, natural gas, and environmental attribute pricing.

Our advanced in-house capabilities are strengthened by our utilization of EnCompass, an established economic energy model that accounts for all fundamental market drivers, including transmission constraints, unit-level dispatching, fuel prices, emission constraints, and more. This resource is leveraged with our existing abilities to provide a wide range of rigorous modeling and forecasting services including:

• In-depth electric market price forecasts throughout North America
• Market trend and sensitivity analysis
• Cost/benefit/risk analysis
• Independent, third-party due diligence reports for project financing
• Valuation studies
• Scenario analysis
• Plant repowering analysis

EnCompass provides a highly effective modeling platform that supplements our extensive knowledge of project development, energy economics, energy markets, RTOs, and economic and environmental issues. Through the use of this tool, Gabel Associates can deliver sophisticated analytics and comprehensive forecasts for all regions of the country.

Gabel Associates also uses its proprietary Analytical Likelihood of Availability and Non-Performance Risk (ALAN) model to compute the financial exposure of capacity resources within the PJM and ISO-NE footprints. ALAN uses resource outage data and expected performance assessment event information to determine the probable coincidence of outages and performance assessment events.

On a probabilistic basis, ALAN allows clients to determine their risk appetite for non-performance charges, evaluate how much risk should be priced into capacity market offers, value insurance products and/or other hedge strategies, and assess the probability of impacts of non-performance penalties on financial metrics including debt service coverage.

The firm draws on its long experience with utility cost of service and rate design to provide long-term utility rate forecasting. Our advanced modeling programs and access to historical and real-time energy data allow us to provide our clients with detailed analysis of energy markets customized to their particular needs.

The firm has conducted hundreds of long-term price utility rate and/or wholesale forecasts during its assessment of energy projects, studies, and procurement programs. We also have a strong national presence, having completed forecasting projects around the country.

We have completed forecasts and analyzed rate structures behind utilities throughout the United States, including analysis of the following utility tariffs and wholesale markets: