Comment by Chilko

This really depends on the pricing mechanisms & contracts that large industrial users have with their energy provider. Many users may contract out of wholesale spot prices in favour for a more predictable contracted price - and demand response could form part of that contract. Depending on the market, financial hedges are also an option.

For instance, in New Zealand we have an aluminium smelter (Tiwai point) that constitutes about ~13% of national electricity demand. The smelter recently re-contracted its electricity supply with several of the major power companies (a 20-yr agreement) which includes a component for demand response when required. NZ has a ~80% renewable grid with hydro and wind as major variable sources, which creates both hourly and seasonal variation in the wholesale spot price (dependant on wind and rain resource). In the event of a major drought that pushes up prices due to a lack of hydro (this happened last year), the agreement with the smelter means it will shutdown some of its operating lines in exchange for demand response payments. This is exactly what occurred, whereas other industrial users that did not have such agreements in place or chose to take advantage of previously low spot prices without adequate hedging were then exposed and also shut down, without being paid to so.