Forward Price View

ZEPG Long-Term Forward Price Views

ZE PowerGroup Inc.^® produces a wide range of long-term energy price forecasts to fully encompass the highly integrated nature of the energy markets. These include the markets for electricity, natural gas, coal, oil and emissions allowances.

ZEPG Forward Price Views are projected up to 30-years, for on-peak, off-peak and 24-hour wholesale electricity prices, in both real and nominal dollars.

In addition to the standard fundamental and economic analyses, our unique, top-down approach enables our models to also account for factors relating to business cycles and speculative market behaviors. Our forecasts are presented as probabilistic estimates of future prices, with 50% and 90% confidence intervals. Our reports are reviewed regularly to ensure you have the most current information.

Support for Your Long-Term Strategic Planning

Few industries, if any, are immune from the impacts of changes in the energy markets. Understanding energy issues is critical for planners and executive decision-makers who manage operations and resource portfolios, and evaluate long-term investment risks and returns. Our products address the long-term planning needs of market participants from small independent power producers, to industrial consumers and large regional utilities. Whether you are looking for a foundation for your long-term planning activities, or you are looking for an independent reference to compare your internal forecasts, our deliverables provide you with:

A single, comprehensive reference resource to help you internalize the state of the market and all of its driving forces;
Analytical insights and expert opinions to help you with your operational, investment, and strategic management decisions;
An expansive collection of objective conclusions and statistics to add weight to your marketing or negotiating efforts.

Understand Our Analysis

Our forecasts are supported with extensive, detailed discussions of:

Regional energy markets - their structures, governing bodies, generation mixes, marginal operating units;
Policy - national and regional regulatory environments and requirements, and expectations of future evolution;
Transmission - power line and pipeline infrastructure, regional trade patterns, and impacts of delivery constraints on prices;
Economics - Supply, demand, reserve margin, and future supply development and load characteristics;
Modeling - assumptions of economic, financial, technological and operating parameters.

What Makes Our Forecasts Unique?

Technical Description

The ZE Long-Term Forward Price View is a comprehensive product that provides critical decision support to investors, executives, planners and portfolio managers. ZE PowerGroup was one of the few firms in the industry to correctly forecast the astronomical rise and subsequent fall of energy prices during the California energy crisis of 2000-2001

For convenient reference, our forecasts can be provided to you in MS Excel format.

Another option is to access forecast data through ZEMA, our proprietary web-based data acquisition, analysis, and management software.

Forecasts are available for individual market regions across North America.

Probabilistic Modeling Techniques

Long-term forecasting is a difficult and complex process. Data acquisition, data analysis, and expert judgment play critical roles in compiling a long-term energy market outlook. Inevitably there will be some uncertainties in modeling parameters over the forecast period. To account for these future uncertainties, our forecasts are presented as probabilistic distributions with confidence intervals using stochastic meth ods, providing you with a more complete forward price view to guide your long-term planning.

A Different Approach to Market Modeling

Typical industry forecasts rely on bottom-up generation models that assume purely economically rational behavior. We believe that such models are overly simplistic and cannot sufficiently account for market-based behavioral patterns attributed to imbalances in market power, structural inefficiencies, and speculative financial interests.

Our top-down approach provides a different perspective of the markets. While fundamental analysis is obviously essential, ZEPG models also take into account economic business cycles factors, historical price behaviors, regulatory developments, technological development - all of which utilize our industry experience and expert knowledge to model opportunistic market behaviors and subsequent market pricing.

Our History

ZE PowerGroup has been developing forward price views for the energy market since the advent of electricity industry deregulation in 1996. Our senior personnel have held executive-level positions at major utilities. We understand the challenges and obstacles that decision-makers face in long-term planning. At every level of industry - owners, operators, marketers and traders - we can help you make sense of today's energy markets.