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Smoothing Quantile Regression Averaging: A new approach to probabilistic forecasting of electricity prices

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  • Bartosz Uniejewski

Abstract

Accurate short-term price forecasting is essential for daily operations in electricity markets. This article introduces a new method, called Smoothing Quantile Regression (SQR) Averaging, that improves upon well-performing probabilistic forecasting schemes. To demonstrate its utility, a comprehensive study is conducted on two electricity markets, including recent data covering the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The performance of SQR Averaging is evaluated both in terms of reliability and sharpness measures, and economic benefits from a trading strategy. The latter utilizes battery storage and sets limit orders using selected quantiles of the predictive distribution. SQR Averaging leads to profit increases of up to 3.5\% on average compared to the benchmark strategy based solely on point forecasts. This is strong evidence for the practical value of using probabilistic forecasts in day-ahead power trading, even in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic and geopolitical disruptions.

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  • Bartosz Uniejewski, 2023. "Smoothing Quantile Regression Averaging: A new approach to probabilistic forecasting of electricity prices," Papers 2302.00411, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2024.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2302.00411
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    Cited by:

    1. Weronika Nitka & Rafał Weron, 2023. "Combining predictive distributions of electricity prices. Does minimizing the CRPS lead to optimal decisions in day-ahead bidding?," Operations Research and Decisions, Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Management, vol. 33(3), pages 105-118.
    2. Sheybanivaziri, Samaneh & Le Dréau, Jérôme & Kazmi, Hussain, 2024. "Forecasting price spikes in day-ahead electricity markets: techniques, challenges, and the road ahead," Discussion Papers 2024/1, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Business and Management Science.
    3. Tomasz Serafin & Bartosz Uniejewski, 2024. "Ranking probabilistic forecasting models with different loss functions," Papers 2411.17743, arXiv.org.
    4. Marcjasz, Grzegorz & Narajewski, Michał & Weron, Rafał & Ziel, Florian, 2023. "Distributional neural networks for electricity price forecasting," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).

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