This report, Electricity Market Visions to Support a Reliable and Affordable Electric Grid Under Electricity Decarbonization, describes how organized electricity markets can play a key role in achieving a future clean electricity system that maintains the goals of affordability and reliability while fostering further innovation. See also accompanying white papers authored by individual task force members, linked below.

An ESIG task force undertook a collaborative effort to describe a coherent vision of how a future electricity market can provide efficient signals such that meeting electricity demand with all zero-emitting clean energy resources leads to a reliable and affordable system that is fair and equitable. This report presents a collective vision regarding particular goals and core fundamentals and highlights areas still under active debate. Task force participants included experts from independent system operators and regional transmission organizations, market participants, expert practitioners, and other key stakeholder groups.

The group focused on four key principles for what a market needs to do today and in the future: (1) to enable innovation such that market designs show the right signals to improve upon the existing technology when cost-effective, (2) to incentivize investment decisions when needed to meet reliability needs and maximize efficiency, (3) to allow for hedging from suppliers and consumers when uncertainty or variability can increase risk, and (4) to provide an incentive for the existing market participants to operate in a way to maximize efficiency and to contribute to reliability.

The market design vision draws from views on different aspects of price formation, market participation by responsive demand, operational reliability, resource adequacy, transmission and other infrastructure, and clean energy incentives. The task force recognizes that different regions may see different clean electricity scenarios at different times and thus may introduce market design and policy at different points. Global collaboration will be critical for understanding impacts and collaborating on future concepts that can support the evolution toward 100% clean electricity.

Authors and key contributors of the report hosted a webinar on March 12, 2025. Click here to download presentation materials and review the recording.

See also the market vision white papers by Kelli Joseph of the World Resources Institute, “The Limits of Markets: A Reliable Transition Needs Planning” and Jacob Mays of Cornell University, “Facilitating Decarbonization of Electricity Through Full-Strength Prices and Mandatory Contracts.”