An email alarm from our display NEM-Watch alerted me to the AEMO Market Notice issued this afternoon about the looming tight supply/demand balance for South Australia and Victoria:
- For Summer 2016-17 in South Australia; and
- For Summer 2017-18 in both South Australia and Victoria (i.e. following the closure of Hazelwood at the end of Q1 2017).
The full text of the Notice is here:
Given our ongoing interest in the supply/demand balance, I opened one of the older widgets in ez2view (PASA) to have a look at the magnitude of the shortfall for each of the regions – firstly for South Australia, and then Victoria:
Flipping the display to look at Victoria, we see how Victoria turns to deficit for selected summer periods in summer 2017-18, showing the significant effect the closure of Hazelwood will have on the supply/demand balance:
For a final view of the Victorian situation we use one of the newer widgets in ez2view (Forecast Convergence) and see how successive forecasts of Surplus Capacity (forecasts published every week over the prior 2 years) have changed:
The change in MT PASA following the Hazelwood closure announcement stands out starkly.
Australia needs to take care of and replace its conventional generators, the only component of supply that can deal reliably with broken equipment, and the low-wind days of heatwaves, but is it possible to change the tide of public opinion and the adverse economics before widespread power outages does that the hard way?
A question that arises with the Victoria and SA being short energy over the 17/18 summer. Does this result in the SA-Vic inter-connectors being under utilised as NSW/Tas can not import enough to flow through Victoria onto SA to meet demand?
Check out the wind turbine State’s output for Dec 6th by knocking out all check boxes except SA and subtotal to see the obvious problem-
http://anero.id/energy/wind-energy/2016/december/6
Seems the regulators are going to have to guarantee via the market, the returns of Torrens Island and Pelican Point by all accounts-
“The COAG meeting discussed an interim report from Chief Scientist Dr Alan Finkel on energy security, which was commissioned after the September 29 blackout.
Dr Finkel told The Advertiser that measures had been put in place to safeguard SA’s power supply, including new procedures adopted by the Australian Energy Market Operator. “Within the last week, AEMO has put forth a requirement that there has to be a minimum of two synchronous generators operating at all times within SA,” Dr Finkel said. “That provides voltage support and system strength.”
The synchronous generators are gas-fired turbines, which are more reliable than solar or wind power and stabilise the network.”
http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/new-rules-to-reduce-blackout-risk-in-sa-as-jay-weatherill-and-malcolm-turnbull-brawl-over-energy-security/news-story/6bf5edaf8944068f2b2e3d6d3d80b078
So much for Australia’s phony national electricity market where all electrons were supposed to be equal but anyone with any technical brains knew some are more equal than others.
When you create a phony national electricity market then naturally there’s only one answer when you realise you’ve stuffed it. More of the same-
http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/31-million-to-help-sa-businesses-struggling-under-high-electricity-bills-announced-in-midyear-budgt-review/news-story/3bad76be1b38c0507610fa6eb70a4218