What are negative electricity prices—and how do they arise?
Imagine it's a sunny Sunday: Solar panels across Germany are producing lots of energy. But companies are closed and offices are deserted. Demand for electricity is correspondingly low.
If the energy cannot be stored because there is a lack of demand flexibility, the system becomes overloaded. This causes prices to fall below zero – and producers have to pay to feed electricity into the grid.
In 2025, this situation occurred on more than 16 full days.
Why negative prices are a problem
How does this trend harm us in Germany? Negative prices are not only a cost factor, but also have systemic and ecological effects:
- Higher system costs – due to emergency shutdowns
- Wasted renewable energy – instead of supplying households or charging cars
- Grid stress – especially in regions where electricity flows cannot be absorbed
Conclusion: Without flexibility, cheap green electricity becomes a problem rather than a solution. And: We are missing out on the opportunity to use clean energy.
Flexibility: The key to the energy transition
Flexibility can be an important building block for an affordable and robust electricity system. It makes it possible to shift electricity consumption and generation in time and to store energy for this purpose. Flexibility can prevent the shutdown of renewable energies and makes an electricity system without fossil fuel power plants possible in the first place.
Flexibility acts as a kind of shock absorber for the power grid.
Examples of flexible systems:
- Home storage and battery storage systems that store energy at midday and release it in the evening.
- Electric cars that can be charged and discharged as needed.
- Intelligent control systems that perform load shifts or storage operations in real time.
On the road to the future, demand flexibility will also become more important. This refers to the ability to flexibly adjust electricity consumption over time, i.e., to shift or control it in order to respond to the current electricity supply or grid conditions.
How do consumers benefit?
With the right integration, surplus renewable energy is stored and not wasted. This maintains grid stability. And last but not least, consumers also benefit from lower energy costs.
Our V2G offering Mobilize Power has been available in France since 2024: Our V2G customers there are already saving around 30 euros per month on their electricity bills – simply by parking their electric vehicles for 14 hours a day. This shows that flexibility benefits not only the grid, but also consumers.
What we do at The Mobility House Energy
We bundle the flexibility of electric vehicles and battery storage systems in a virtual power plant. We then actively trade these on the European spot and secondary markets – fully automatically. We apply a multi-market strategy, which means we optimize between and within several markets simultaneously. This ensures maximum revenues and at the same time contributes to the stabilization of the power grid.
The result: less wasted clean energy due to fewer interruptions, less CO2, improved grid stability – and a higher return on flexibility investments.
Our projects
- V2G with Renault: EV drivers charge for free by supporting the grid. Learn more
- EUREF field study in Berlin: Thousands of euros per vehicle per year possible through flexibility. Learn more
You can find an overview of all our V2G projects here.
What needs to happen now
Now is the time to unleash the full potential of flexibility. What is needed to achieve this? We must finally abolish double taxation for electricity temporarily stored in vehicle batteries – just as has long been the norm for stationary storage systems.
Smart meters are being rolled out across the board, digitally and in a customer-friendly manner, as the basis for a modern energy infrastructure.
We are focusing on dynamic grid fees to create real incentives for grid-friendly behavior – and to make vehicle-to-grid economically attractive.
The technologies are ready – we just need to clear the way.