Section 6 Ancillary Services

IFM Procurement and Prices

Table 6.1 shows the monthly IFM average ancillary service procurement and Table 6.2 shows the monthly IFM average ancillary service prices.

In December the monthly IFM average procurement increased for regulation up, non-spinning and spinning, while decreased for regulation-down reserves compared to the previous month. The monthly IFM average prices decreased for regulation up, regulation down, spinning and non-spinning reserves compared to the previous month.

Table 6.1: IFM Monthly Average Ancillary Service Procurement
Month Nov-2025 Dec-2025 Percent Change
Regulation_Up 530 602 14%
Regulation_Down 953 887 -7%
Spin 710 734 3%
Non-Spin 671 900 34%
Table 6.2: IFM Monthly Average Ancillary Service Price
Ancillary Service Nov-2025 Dec-2025 Percent Change
Non-Spin $0.72 $0.69 -4.9%
Regulation_Down $4.02 $2.59 -35.4%
Regulation_Up $1.73 $1.32 -23.8%
Spin $0.77 $0.69 -10.5%

Figure 6.1 shows the daily IFM average ancillary service prices.

Day-ahead ancillary service prices remained volatile in December, similar to the previous month.

Figure 6.1: IFM (Day-Ahead) Ancillary Service Average Price

IFM (Day-Ahead) Ancillary Service Average Price

Daily average ancillary procurement and prices in the real-time market (FMM) are shown in the Appendix.

Scarcity Events

The ancillary services scarcity pricing mechanism is triggered when the ISO is not able to procure the target quantity of one or more ancillary services in the IFM and real-time market runs. The scarcity events in this month are shown in Table 6.3 below.

Table 6.3: Ancillary Service Scarcity Events
Date Hour Ending Interval Ancillary Service Region Shortfall Percentage of requirement