Article 17 4.

Member States may require electricity undertakings or participating final customers to pay financial compensation to other market participants or to the market participants' balance responsible parties, if those market participants or balance responsible parties are directly affected by demand response activation. Such financial compensation shall not create a barrier to market entry for market participants engaged in aggregation or a barrier to flexibility. In such cases, the financial compensation shall be strictly limited to covering the resulting costs incurred by the suppliers of participating customers or the suppliers' balance responsible parties during the activation of demand response. The method for calculating compensation may take account of the benefits brought about by the independent aggregators to other market participants and, where it does so, the aggregators or participating customers may be required to contribute to such compensation but only where and to the extent that the benefits to all suppliers, customers and their balance responsible parties do not exceed the direct costs incurred. The calculation method shall be subject to approval by the regulatory authority or by another competent national authority.