Confirmation of Core – CH Consideration go-live for business day 11 March 2026
The Core project parties are pleased to confirm that 11 March 2026 has been established as the go-live date for Swissgrid’s inclusion in the Core day-ahead capacity calculation.
An impact assessment on Core day-ahead capacities was performed as part of the go-live preparatory activities by the TSOs upon request by NRAs.
Integration and non-regression tests were carried out on all calculation stages—pre-coupling, coupling, and post-coupling—which confirmed the stability of the process.
Core project parties consider the results representative and anticipate no substantial impact from deploying the Swissgrid consideration in the Core day-ahead capacity calculation. The parties will continue to monitor developments closely until the go-live date.
A final operational communication regarding the preparation and completion of Swissgrid’s integration into the Core day-ahead capacity calculation is anticipated during the week of 9 March 2026.
The solution intended for go-live allows Swissgrid to participate in the Core day-ahead capacity calculation through the individual validation step. If operational security within the Swiss transmission system cannot be maintained using remedial actions, Swissgrid may activate security constraints by including Swiss critical network elements in the Core day-ahead flow-based domain for SDAC market coupling, potentially limiting day-ahead market coupling activity.
Swissgrid is required to comply with the rules for individual validation, as well as various transparency requirements outlined in Article 17 of the amended Swiss Consideration Package.
These regulations ensure Swissgrid adheres to the same standards as Core TSOs for both validation and transparency. The Core NRAs and ElCom have agreed upon the concept description documentation, as detailed in the joint position paper signed on 20 January 2026.
This milestone partially fulfils the initial objectives set for the Swissgrid integration into the Core day-ahead capacity calculation project. The originally targeted solution of coordinated NTC calculation on Swiss-Northern Borders and joint cross-regional validation of cross-zonal capacities will not be implemented. Core TSOs, Swissgrid, Core NRAs, and ElCom have jointly decided to bypass this step and allocate resources towards efficient implementation of Coordinated Validation and day-ahead capacity calculation in Central Europe CCR.
Accordingly, for Swissgrid, the go-live scheduled for 11 March 2026 represents the final implementation step. Future considerations regarding Swissgrid’s participation in Central Europe day-ahead capacity calculation will be governed under the Central Europe CCR day-ahead capacity calculation implementation project.
Communication channels:
Market participants who would like to follow the Core project developments are invited to join the Core Consultative Group (CCG) by signing up to the Core CG distribution list [link]. The participants of the Core Consultative Group will receive regular information, and invitations to teleconferences and meetings.
Next to the Core CG, a Question & Answer Forum for the Core FB capacity calculation project is currently in use. The Forum can be accessed via https://coreforum.my-ems.net/.
The Core TSOs invite all market participants to use this Forum for their queries.
About the DA CH consideration project and it’s relation to Core CCR
On April 2019, a specific contract between the TSOs of the continental European synchronized grid was concluded with the Synchronous Area Framework Agreement (“SAFA”), where TSOs committed to develop a technical solution on how to consider the Swiss Transmission System in operational security processes and in capacity calculation.
On December 2019, Swissgrid was invited into the CORE CCR accompanied by a letter of Intent that set forth the way of working together.
Core TSOs and Swissgrid worked together in designing a technical solution for CH consideration which materialized in the CH consideration package validated by Core NRAs in 2024.
The methodological package was then further amended in 2025, to feature the rules for Swissgrid’s participation during individual validation. Ultimately, it was validated by the regulatory authorities in January 2026 and serves as the regulatory basis for the go-live.