Last updated: 5 September 2025
The UK flexibility market continues to grow, with 9GW contracted in 2024. New regulations and digital infrastructure are coming into play to support the National Energy System Operator’s target of 12GW consumer-led flexibility by 2030. So, here are five key developments shaping UK flexibility and its flex markets in 2025.
This blog covers:
- P483 unlocks domestic flexibility before Market-Wide Half-Hourly Settlement (MHHS)
- Demand Flexibility Service (DFS) evolves into year-round tool
- Elexon combines Open Networks legacy with market facilitator role
- Digital infrastructure accelerates flexibility market integration
- BiTraDER creates new market for trading curtailment obligations
1. P483 unlocks domestic flexibility before Market-Wide Half-Hourly Settlement (MHHS)
Ofgem approved BSC Modification P483 in August 2025, which removes the half-hourly settlement requirement for aggregators to trade domestic flexibility. This enables Virtual Lead Parties to access around 345,000 households and small businesses previously excluded from UK flexibility markets.
For consumers, P483 means immediate access to new revenue streams through flexibility services without waiting for smart meter upgrades or Market-Wide Half-Hourly Settlement (MHHS) implementation in 2026. Consumers earn money by adjusting consumption during peak times whilst contributing to a lower-carbon grid.
2. Demand Flexibility Service (DFS) evolves into year-round tool
The Demand Flexibility Service (DFS) transformed from emergency winter service to year-round balancing tool in November 2024. This will operate as an “in-merit service”, dispatched when competitive compared with alternative methods like increasing generation or using interconnectors with other countries. This new version will build on more than 7GWh delivered across more than 4 million participants over the previous two winters.
The DFS model demonstrates how moving closer to real-time procurement and enabling stackability with other services can scale participation and ensure more certainty over requirements.
3. Elexon combines Open Networks legacy with market facilitator role
Elexon will begin market facilitator operations in late 2025. It will build on the Open Networks programme’s standardisation achievements including aligned flexibility products, common settlement processes, and dispatch APIs.
The phased handover throughout 2025 transfers technical working groups from the Energy Networks Association (ENA) to Elexon. This ensures continuity whilst introducing enhanced governance for the UK flexibility market.
Elexon’s 2025 flexibility roadmap outlines planned delivery of 12 GW consumer-led flexibility by 2030 through coordinated market development.
Key milestones include publishing initial Flexibility Market Rules in Q4 2025 and launching the Flexibility Market Asset Register (FMAR) in 2027 – a single source of truth for assets under 1MW that eliminates duplicate registrations across markets.
The roadmap emphasises reducing friction between transmission and distribution markets whilst preserving local flexibility for DSOs to meet specific network needs.
4. Digital infrastructure accelerates flexibility market integration
Two standardisation initiatives advance in 2025 to unlock flexibility at scale. The Data Sharing Infrastructure, now in pilot development with NESO’s Virtual Energy System programme, eliminates the need for separate data agreements with each market operator – currently a major barrier requiring extensive manual workarounds that limit participation to sophisticated flexibility service providers (FSPs).
The Flexibility Markets Unlocked programme is another standardisation project, delivering Flexify, a web-based platform improving UK flexibility market access. This sits alongside Flexibility Data Standards – to enhance transparency and interoperability for data exchange – and the Market Rules Test Bed to assess the impact of market rules within the flex ecosystem. Government-backed initiatives like these address the core challenge facing local flexibility markets in the UK: reducing the complexity and cost of participating across multiple platforms and protocols.
5. BiTraDER creates new market for trading curtailment obligations
BiTraDER enters live trial phase in 2025, creating a new flexibility market where providers can bilaterally trade curtailment obligations. Operating initially in the SP Electricity North West area, this first-of-its-kind market allows flexibility assets facing network constraints to trade their positions with other assets that can deliver the required response.
This innovation fundamentally changes how curtailment is managed, becoming a tradeable commodity. By enabling high-level platform integration and two-way data flows between market participants, BiTraDER demonstrates how new market mechanisms can unlock value from existing flexibility assets whilst maintaining grid stability. It’s a model that could transform how DSO flexibility markets handle network constraints globally.
Looking ahead
The 2025 developments provide clear pathways to 12GW consumer-led flexibility by 2030. P483’s immediate access, DFS evolution, and Elexon’s market facilitator implementation create a strong foundation for Clean Power 2030.
As MHHS approaches in 2026 and digital infrastructure moves to deployment, these developments position flexibility as fundamental to balancing our energy system.
Read more
6 energy flexibility trends and updates from the European Union (EU) in 2025
Here’s an overview of some of the trends in 2025 affecting how that flexibility is developing in the EU.
A guide to flexibility services for UK providers
What FSPs need to know about participating in UK flexibility markets.
Your guide to flexibility market types and how they work
Here’s an overview of the key flexibility market types and the network challenges they help address.
